Blood Bowl: 'Ere We Go, vI
by maddokgrotsnik
Summary: The Orctown Oldboyz - and their reluctant dwarf coach, Edwyrd Kettlebelly - are headed to the Chaos Cup. They're not expecting to win, but they are looking forward to bashing a few heads. Little do they know just what they'll find themselves up against: an implacable new foe, and a terrifying threat to the Old World. It's time for a plucky underdog story.
1. Chapter 1

It was time. A new season.

In the vast, shattered strongholds of Clan Nosebiter, leagues beneath the surface of the World's Edge mountains, entire battalions of dwarves and hordes of vicious Night Goblins lowered their hammers and knives, gave each other slightly sheepish looks, and began the long trudge back to their respective camps...

Just outside the wreckage of a burning village on the Border Principalities, the Necrarch vampire lord Fintir Gavsraven sighed, checked his pocket watch, and ordered his shambling legions of the undead to return to a small field outside of Reikland, which he'd booked specially in advance for this year's training sessions…

In an underground laboratory brimming with violent green warpstone and acrid smoke, a rat-man sorcerer ran back and forth, chittering with agitation as he tried to make sense of his dark masters' latest demand, 'Mutant With Big-Big Hand And Innate Understanding Of Loose-Knit Caging Manoeuvre'...

An entire forest of peaceful wood elves was without warning swallowed up and regurgitated as a twitching mass of flesh and splintered wood and bone, as the dark gods of Chaos materialised an entire stadium in preparation for the upcoming Chaos Cup…

In the sulphurous ruins of a conference facility just off the Great Eastern Road, a thousand high mages of the Association of Broadcasting Conjurers battled it out with an army of giggling sorcerers from the Necromancers' Broadcasting Circle, trying to win exclusive Cabalvision rights for another year…

In a discreet top room of Von Hinkelstein's Haberdashery and Ironsmith's, the eighteen members of the Referees' Guild gathered to have themselves fitted for new suits of full-plate body armour, with a sense of weary inevitability…

In the streets and alleyways of every town, blue scarves clashed with red banners, beer spilled into gore, and the chant went up, from a million mouths…

 **BLOOD BOWL! BLOOD BOWL! BLOOD BOWL!**


	2. Chapter 2

It was time. A new season.

Edwyrd smiled. It almost felt genuine.

"I am an excellent dwarf," he reminded himself, as per the _2522 Self-Actualisation Almanac and Prophecies of Guillio Star_ , which his mother had kindly leant him. 'I am well-liked and have a keen sense of my most successful attributes-"

He took a moment to vomit again across the back of the bandstand.

"- and the auguries have revealed no imminent predictions of my violent death. Today will be a day in which I will achieve everything I set out to do."

He straightened up, took a deep breath, and blinked the water out of his eyes.

Distantly, across the recreation fields of Old Ghoul's Green, he could hear the team warming up. His team.

Reaching down into his satchel, he felt for his lovingly-scrunched copy of Tomolandry the Undying's _How To Be A Successful Coach, Stupid!_

 _Blood Bowl is more than a sport. It is an art, stupid. And as such, the coach is more than a leader, an organiser, a tactician. He is an artist, and the players his brushes, and the blood his paint, and the pitch his canvas, and the game his masterpiece. This is called a metaphor, stupid._

Edwyrd had never been quite sure why Tomolandry's guide insisted on addressing the reader as 'stupid' every few paragraphs. Probably, as with many undead-penned books, it had been ghostwritten.

He flipped through to page 3.

 _CHAPTER 1: MEETING THE TEAM. A successful coach will make an instant impression on his team. They will understand implicitly that he is both one of them and one up on them. He is in charge and a leader of the charge. He is on their side and much more besides. He is (Hans - can we cut some of this steaming crap out before it goes to print? Because seriously, Hans, you're not paid by the word.)_

Edwyrd lowered the pamphlet.

"All right," he said, and felt some of the strength returning to his voice. "Instant impression. No problem at all."


	3. Chapter 3

The voice carried like a foghorn, if foghorns usually emanated from a place just beneath your codpiece.

"OOLLLLLLLRIGHT! LISSSTEN UP, LADIES, BECAUSE I DON'T AIN'T GOT MUCH TIME FOR THIS AND IF YOU DON'T PAY ATTENTION I WON'T AIN'T DON'T GOT NO TIME FOR YOU IN MY TEAM EITHER I AM EDWYRD KETTLEBELLY, YES, THAT'S OF THE LEGENDARY CLAN KETTLEBELLY and I am here to whip you into...whip you into…"

Edwyrd stopped walking. His lips continued to move for some time, intent on finishing their speech just as they'd previously arranged.

Just ahead of him, on the swampiest and most battered pitch of the green, the Orctown Oldboyz, deaf to his entrance, continued to beat the living snot out of each other.

A big red thing with a gaping mouth of glinting white teeth bounced joyously back and forth through the melee, savaging shoelaces and dribbling something that smoked and sparked. Two of the team's blitzers, tusked and leathery, were laying merrily into the prone thrower with their hobnailed boots. A much larger, shambling green-skinned monster was attempting with some amount of success to eat the ball.

Edwyrd gazed at it ruefully. He was pretty sure it was a troll. And he was supposed to slay trolls, technically speaking. He just wasn't quite sure how you were supposed to go about it.

Slowly, he removed the scrumpled-up note from beneath his chainmail vest and stared at it, to check he hadn't got the time or the date wrong.

 _Old Ghoul's Green, Playing Field Nineteen, Midday. Team will be there. Put them through their paces!_ _Leopold Bruckheimer_

Nowhere did his new boss's memo mention orcs. Or trolls. Or the big red indeterminate thing, which had now stolen a player's helmet and was using it to hit another player vigorously in the groin.

Edwyrd turned and gazed back over the other playing fields, where the distant teams were busy practicing passes, throwing the ball back and forth, tackling, and running. Blood Bowl practice, in short.

It was obvious now what must have happened. These greenskin hooligans had seized Playing Field Nineteen - his team's playing field - for themselves, and his new comrades had simply moved to another pitch. He'd go and join up with them now, and they'd have a good laugh about this silly, minor misunderstanding.

Yes, that was probably it.

He was just turning to go when a voice said, some distance above his shoulder,

"Come to watch the fun, have you? You've picked the right time for it. Dok McKlowd over there's been testing out a new fungus-beer-powered jetpack and I think today's going to be the day it finally explodes."

Edwyrd found himself staring up into the grinning face of a madman; a wiry, ash-stained face, filled with spiky red hair that protruded from every possible angle and out of every possible orifice. A pipe, precariously clutched between the creature's few black teeth, smoked and billowed softly.

The apparition nodded at him, and, tucking its faded crimson robes around it, sat down cross-legged on the wet grass and began to watch.

After a moment, it produced a bagful of McMurty's Famed Potato Segments and began to munch on them.

"Um," Edwyrd said. "Um."

His fellow spectator glanced back around at him, made a sympathetic noise, and offered him a crisp.

"No," Edwyrd said. "No, thank you. Look, I'm supposed to be coaching a team on this pitch, so I really must insist that…'

The human's thick ginger eyebrows creased suspiciously.

"Coach?" he asked.

Edwyrd felt a little relieved.

"Yes!" he said. "Yes, exactly! So I really must insist that, uh, your...players…"

"Bruckheimer send you?"

Edwyrd's heart sank into his boots.

"...he did," he managed, weakly.

The human's face split into a grin; the pipe lurched downwards, spilling red ash, as he extended a hand for Edwyrd to shake.

"Bloody good to see you," he said. "Bloody good. Bruckheim said he might be sending somebody new. We've had a bit of trouble finding anybody, you know. Name's Fourtooth. Bright Wizard. Team apothecary. Pleasure's all mine."

"Edwyrd," said Edwyrd, "and you- listen, are you telling me you're responsible for healing these monsters?"

"Monsters?" Fourtooth repeated, mildly. "Oh, the Oldboyz. Well, it's an easy job, you know. Orcs don't like to admit that they're injured. So I just wait until the end of training and then patch up everyone who's lying out cold on the ground...oh, good hit, Grobb! Good hit!"

He began applauding wildly as an orc went flying up into the air.

Edwyrd stared at him.

"I'd like to speak with them," he said. "Do they...I mean, when do they finish training?"

Fourtooth plucked thoughtfully at his beard.

"Oh," he said, "usually it's when all of them are out cold, bar one. And even then, usually he'll knock himself out with a few punches to the face, out of solidarity. That's probably not much good to you, mind."

"No," Edwyrd said, very carefully. "Probably not."

"Listen," said Fourtooth. "Why don't I call the captain over and the two of you can get introduced? Him and me have had a certain rapport ever since I let him sew my scalpels into his helmet for the Tribal Leegs play-offs."

Edwyrd began,  
"I don't think that's a very good-"

The wizard cupped his gnarled, tobacco-stained hands together.

"OI! WAZ!"


	4. Chapter 4

Edwyrd went pale as the shout echoed out across the grass.

An enormous greenskin, clad in the team's blue and black leathers, punched one of his teammates decisively in the mouth a couple of times before turning around in their direction. Waving one massive hand, he lurched forward towards them, stepping absent-mindedly on his fallen teammates as he went.

"Wazguttle's the intellectual of the group," Fourtooth said confidingly. "He's caught the ball three times in training so far. And he actually knows what a foul is, so he doesn't rip the referee's arms off when – Waz," he called, as the orc approached, "this dwarven fella wants a word with you."

Wazguttle drew to an abrupt halt. His tiny red eyes fixed onto Edwyrd, and seemed to harden.

Edwyrd took a step backwards and considered his chances of successfully running away.

Slim, he decided. Wazguttle's legs were about three times the size of his, and bulging with veins and packed fungus-muscle.

"Hey, there," he said, haltingly. "Nice to meet you...sir. I'm the new coach."

Wazguttle continued to stare at him. His gargantuan green biceps rose, and fell. Finally, a scarlet tongue emerging from between two thick tusks, he grunted,

"Kotch?"

He glanced across towards Fourtooth, as if seeking help with a difficult philosophical question.

"A coach," the wizard said, waving his arms in explanation, "is someone who tells you what to do on the pitch. Advises you," he added quickly, taking note of the slow, stormy frown spreading across Wazguttle's brow. "He advises you on what you should do. Who you should hit first, and so on."

Wazguttle still appeared to be confused by this new information.

"We ain't had never no kotch before," he muttered.

"Yes, you have," Fourtooth said, quietly.

Edwyrd gave him an urgent sideways glance.

"Your owner sent me," he said, hoping to appeal to authority.

Wazguttle looked blankly at him.

"Sigmar's arse," Fourtooth said, "Leopold Bruckheimer, the owner. You remember him, Waz. He bought the team from the executors of Hampton Marz' estate last year. And I know you remember Hampton Marz, because you were the one who ate him. Short man, balding. You said he tasted like elf."

"I'm here to help you win," Edwyrd insisted.

"'Elp us win," Wazguttle repeated, to himself. He removed his helmet, revealing a shock of spiky black hair, and scratched at his head.

"Yoo's a stuntie," he said.

"Yes," Edwyrd said, and added, unnecessarily, "I know."

Wazguttle belched, with a certain thoughtfulness.

"I've just spent a season apprenticed to the assistant coach of the Pergamo Pastas," Edwyrd continued, pressing his advantage, "and I studied at the College of Middenheim, graduating with a first-class degree in strategic sports theory with majors in tackling and cage manoeuvres – hey, where's it going?"

To his dismay, the big orc had turned around, and was sloping back across the field towards the ongoing battle.

Fourtooth laid a cautionary hand on Edwyrd's helmet.

"Let him go, coach," he said. "He just needs to talk things over with the team. Very democratic, are orcs. They always like to make sure everyone gets a punch in."

Edwyrd watched as Wazguttle got his team's attention, gradually, by grabbing hold of two of them at a time and banging their heads together, and then yelling at them.

"I have to admit," he said, "...I wasn't expecting this. I mean, Mister Bruckheimer, he didn't tell me…"

Fourtooth shrugged.

"Well, we had a bit of trouble advertising for a coach," he said, "after last time. Mind you, old Bruckheimer's always been a tricksy one. There was that time he set us up in a match against a team of giants and then bet heavily against us. And then there was that time he sold us into slavery in the jungles of Lustria. And-"

A few guttural words floated out through the air – "stuntie", "kotch". Some of the players were beginning to peer curiously past Wazguttle in Edwyrd's direction.

"You've got the crowd, coach," Fourtooth said. He gave Edwyrd a cheerful slap on the back. "Go on, introduce yourself. They won't bi- actually, no. Forget I said that."

Edwyrd glared at him.


	5. Chapter 5

Wazguttle gave a little informal salute as Edwyrd approached.

"Dese der boyz," he said, waving towards the amassed team.

Edwyrd gazed into the hungry scarlet eyes of his species' most ancient and implacable enemies.

"Er, hello," he squeaked. "I look forward to working with all of you."

Several of his new team members were, he couldn't help but notice, visibly licking their lips. A few had produced jagged steak knives and were testing the edges.

Quickly, he glanced away - and found himself staring at the toothy red creature, which was scratching furtively at itself on the ground.

"Dat's Squiggie," Wazguttle said helpfully. "Der team mascot."

"He eats the opposition's cheerleaders as well," Fourtooth said, coming up behind Edwyrd. "Great for getting the crowd on your side, although the pom-poms do get stuck in his teeth."

He gazed out over the leering orcs and snapped, with a confidence that made Edwyrd tremble,

"Well, what are you gits looking at? Introduce yourselves, why don't you?"

There was a little shuffling amongst the team-members before one lanky, grinning orc raised a hand.

"I'z Grobb," he mumbled. "I'z der catcha."

"Good," Edwyrd said, taking in his long, gorilla-like arms. "Bet you've got a good reach with those," he added.

Wazguttle beamed proudly.

"'E spent five dayz on da rack ter get like that," he said.

Edwyrd noticed an orc sitting on the far left of the group, wearing what appeared to be thick onyx spectacles and with a grinding metal contraption strapped to its back. Green smoke was rising from the device's many pipes.

"And you must be Dok McKlowd," he said. "How's that jet-pack working out for you?"

The orc gibbered a little in response and raised both thumbs in response.

Wazguttle pointed towards a leathery-looking, unusually short greenskin towards the back of the group.

"Dis is Luggen," he said. "'E's der vet'run of der team. Top scora, too."

Luggen raised his head. Edwyrd caught a sight of sunken, scarred cheeks and burning eyes.

"I's Flirksmasher," a hulking Black Orc said, raising his hand. "An' I'z got a question."

"Of course," Edwyrd said. He smoothed down his chainmail shirt with a newfound pride. This was going quite well, after all. "What would you like to-"

"'Ow do yoo taste best? Roasted, or fried wiv some garlic butter?"

Low, nasty chuckles from all around - and a few murmurs of assent as well.

Grobb, nodding his head vigorously, muttered,

"...dat's a good question, you know, a good question, cos all der cookbooks say different fings…"

Fourtooth snapped,

"That's not why he's-"

"You don't fry a dwarf, Flirk, yoo zoggin' grot," another orc snarled. "Drains all der nutree-ents right outta it-"

"Nutree-ents? Ain't dose der new free-range treemen?"

"Don't yoo be callin' me a grot, yoo grot, Bob Blacktooth-"

Edwyrd could sense he was losing control over his audience.

"All right," he said, clapping his hands. "I thought we could start with some basic passing manoeuvres-"

Someone threw a net over him.

It settled rather sadly over his head and shoulders.

"-some basic passing manoeuvres-"

Flirksmasher drew back a fist and slammed it into the nearest orc's face.

"Stop it!" Fourtooth shouted. "Flirk, stop it! You need to listen to-"

The ball went flying past his face, sending his pipe spiralling into the air.

The wizard's face set.

"Right," he said, decisively. Arcane, golden flames burst from his outstretched palms. "Who did that?"

Edwyrd, from beneath his net, continued, sadly,

"-basic passing manoeuvres and then perhaps a test-"

All around him, the Oldboyzs fought.

"-perhaps a test, it's just a bit of fun, really, to see how much of the game's theory you already know and if there are any gaps in your technical understanding. Then we'll hit the showers and straight for home. I've been your coach, Edwyrd Kettlebelly, thank you very much."

He shrugged the net off, turned, and went trudging back towards the stands without looking back.


	6. Chapter 6

_Chapter 39: If you've followed these instructions carefully, you should now be a fully-fledged Blood Bowl coach! Perhaps your team will go on to success in the big leagues, or die in a particularly interesting or grisly way. In either case - congratulations, stupid!_

Edwyrd clenched the pamphlet tightly in his hand. He could feel tears working their way into eyes, tears of hot outrage and frustration.

On the pitch, the Oldboyz' melee was drawing to a close. Most of the participants appeared to be lying prone on the ground; Flirksmasher and Bob Blacktooth remained standing, swaying gently back and forth, occasionally attempting to punch one another and missing by some distance.

Three hundred miles, he thought. That was how far I walked for this. Through marshlands and the Black Forests and inns filled with humans who'd try to balance their flagons on my head…

...only to come to this.

By Grimnir's beard, it just isn't fair.

He felt a heavy creak from beside him; the stand buckled beneath the weight of something enormous.

"'Ullo," said Wazguttle.

Edwyrd pinched his brow.

"Hello," he replied.

The big orc sat in silence from beside him for a moment, colossal fists sat neatly in his lap.

"Sorry," he said. "If we wuzn't all yoo wuz hopin' for."

"It's OK," said Edwyrd. "Really, it is. It's just that...well, I came a long way to be here, and I always knew I could be a good coach, if I had the right team, and…"

"Where yoo come from?" Wazguttle asked. His big hairless eyebrows lifted curiously.

"Oh," Edwyrd said. "Oh...the World's Edge Mountains. Karak Kadrin."

The orc lifted a hand and gave Edwyrd an enthusiastic slap across the shoulder. It almost knocked him sideways.

"I's from der World's Edge too!" he said, cheerfully. "Used ter be dere wiv Big Boss Shumrok an' his hordes."

"No way," said Edwyrd. He sat back upright, tilting his helmet out so it was no longer covering his eyes. "When was that?"

"Oh, back in der day. Good times, dey wuz. Like when we fought der Nine Heroes o' Black Fire Pass and ate dem. Or when we stormed Karak Unthol and broke der dwarven armies an massacred der...massacred der…"

Slowly, Wazguttle stopped talking.

"It's all right," Edwyrd said. "Really, it is."

"I mean," Wazguttle added, with a flash of inspiration "dey wuz bad dwarves, though, dose ones. We, uh, we know dat cos we overheard dem talkin' about it. Dey wuz all, 'We's bad dwarves, we's gonna attack dose uvver nice dwarves and kill dem fer sum reason.' Really, we wuz doin' yoor lot a favour."

"It's fine, honestly." Edwyard exhaled. "It was a different time back then. Before the leagues, before Spike Magazine. Before any of it. I remember, my dad used to have this big troll's head on our living room wall, before Mum made him get rid of it, and he used to say he cut it off himself at the Battle of…"

He lapsed into silence.

"Fings are better now," Wazguttle said, quietly. "Dey really are. Sumtimes yoo 'ear der younger boyz talkin' about der good ol' days, when it wuz just waagh, waagh, waagh, all der time. But it weren't like dat. It got tirin'. Blood Bowl, it, uh...it brung people togeffer."

"Well, sometimes it tears people apart," said Edwyrd. "Quite literally, even."

Guffawing, the big orc reached up to scratch at his hair.

"Listen," he said. "I understan', if yoo don't wanna kotch us."

"Thank you-"

"Dat cookin' stuff, dat wuz uncalled-fer. Not all right, not one zoggin' bit."

"That's good to hear-"

"Besides, yoo don't fry or roast a dwarf, an' everyone knows dat. Yoo bake a pie an'...an'...an' anyway. If yoo can do all dat stuff yoo wuz talkin' bout - der passin' an' such - I fink yoo might just be what dis team needs."

His eyes met Edwyrd's.

"If you wanna come back termorror," he said, "...an' I get it if yoo don't...maybe we can try dis again."

Edwyrd took a deep breath.

"All right," he said. "All right. Thank you. I'll...I suppose I'll have to think about it."

Wazguttle's face creased into a grin.

"Fanks, kotch," he said.

On the pitch, Flirksmasher tottered once, twice, and fell over.


	7. Chapter 7

The marauders tore through the snow, marauding as they went.

Like most of their kind, they were nomadic; there's precious little time to establish crop rotation and a decent irrigation system when you spend the vast majority of your day trying to figure out how to attach more spikes to your armour.

Sadly, this also placed a certain amount of strain on their abilities to pillage, raid and murder in the name of Khorne the Lord of Skulls, since the places with the most maraudable resource (e.g., helpless villages, isolated farms, comely and shrieking maidens) also tended, these days, to be inhabited by a certain number of unwelcome residents (e.g., plucky heroines, stout heroes, those giant seven-barreled cannons on wheels).

As a result, they'd found themselves forced to hunt for worthwhile prey out in the frozen, inhospitable depths of Norsca - the uncharted continent.

It hadn't gone terribly well so far. Yesterday, they'd sadistically dismembered a small silver birch. This morning, they'd shouted 'Aaargh' at an arctic hare, which ran away.

More than one of them was relieved when they caught sight of something peculiar, high up in the crags and steppes of the mountain range just beyond their encampment.

Smoke rising, over the hills.

Closer inspection revealed a peculiarly-angled structure; a kind of stone temple, protruding from the mountain range, its approach marked by a thousand winding steps down the face of the cliff.

Braziers, set in burnished gold, were blazing blue flame at the building's entrance.

The heavy stone doors were wide open, leading into darkness.

Drawing their axes and lighting their torches, the marauders boldly entered, shouting "Blood for the Blood God" to nobody in particular.

Venturing down the black, dripping corridors, and losing quite a few of their number to the expected pits and deathtraps (including one rather younger marauder who was actually secretly quite a three-dimensional and sensitive soul and was still working up the courage to show his colleagues just how talented he was at woodworking, but that's peer pressure for you), the band finally stepped out into something like a central chamber.

An impossibly high, rounded ceiling, marked by strange engravings. A single pool of blue icy light descended from an oculus in the very centre.

And not empty, either.

At the farthest end of the room, on a raised platform of stone, eleven identical figures stood in a perfect line.

Their armour was golden, rounded - almost chubby-looking, marked out by enormous shoulder pads. Their faces, too, were golden; blank-faced masks set into smug smiles. Beneath the eye-holes, only darkness.

They looked, frankly, a little ridiculous.

The lead marauder, snarling beneath his breath, climbed the platform and glared at the line of immobile opponents.

Raising his axe without warning, he slammed the blade against the nearest figure's stomach.

An empty, hollow clunk. The figure remained still; its armour unbroken.

The marauder's face creased in confusion.

He hit it again.

Another clunk. Sparks flew off the axe blade; a single chip formed in the iron's edge.

No reaction. Shrugging, he spat towards the statue's feet, turned, and leapt back off the platform.

"Nothing here-" he began.

" **PLAY**."

The voice seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere at once, reverberating around the chamber.

And then there were two voices. And three. And four.

" **PLAY. PLAY. PLAY. PLAY**."

The marauder chieftain gazed, bewildered, at his clustered warband - and then turned to stare back at the golden figures.

Their fat golden masks, slowly, creakily, turned to face him.

" **PLAY. PLAY. PLAY. PLAY**."

Their joints contorting with explosions of ancient dust, their eyes shimmering with terrifying blue lightning, the eleven statues took a step forward. And another.

Their fists clenched. Golden blades leapt forth from every arm.


	8. Chapter 8

Edwyrd took a deep breath.

"All right," he said. "Let's try this again."

The Oldboyz were, he was relieved to see, slightly more subdued this morning. Several of them were nursing bruised eyes or clutching bandaged hands.

Fourtooth was sitting at the far end of the row, his hair noticeably singed. He regarded Edwyrd with a slightly dazed expression.

"The rules of Blood Bowl," Edwyrd said, raising his pointer to the small portable chalkboard, "are deceptively simple. In fact, it's often been said, ha-ha, that even a child could tell you the difference between a diving tackle and an illegal foul."

The assembled orcs regarded him with a sullen dismay.

"Moving swiftly on," he continued. "The first and most important tactic of any successful team is denial."

"We got loadsa dat," Grobb said helpfully, raising a hand. "Fourtooth, he always say Mister Bruckheimer in denial about us not bein' a waste o' space."

"Denial of _opportunity_ ," Edwyrd said, barely breaking his stride. "If you have the ball, you need to make sure your carrier is covered. If you *don't* have the ball, you need to make every inch of the playing field count. Force your opponent to make mistakes, to panic, to slip up. Through a series of scenarios, involving caging, throwing, passing-"

A low, nasty growl.

"Dat sound like elf talk," Flirksmasher said. He raised his enormous, battered head high.

"It's not elf talk, I can assure you," said Edwyrd, meeting the orc's gaze as best as he could. "It's just good strategy-"

"It sound like elf talk and it sound like zoggin' poncey talk. Passin'? Throwin'? Ha.' He rapped his chest-plate. 'We's der Oldboyz. We bash der heads in an' we smash der faces and dat's 'ow we win matches. We don't need no zoggin' kotch. Right? Right."

"But you haven't won any matches," Fourtooth said quietly, filling his pipe. "Flirk, you don't win matches by beating the opposition to a pulp. You win by scoring touchdowns. Those are the rules."

A rumble of discontent suggested that not all of the team agreed with this appraisal of the game.

Some of the players started to shove into one another. Flirksmasher, jabbing his finger into the palm of his hand, began to yell,

"-bashed 'is 'ead in real good-"

" **SHADDAP**!"

The noise echoed around the green; startled, a nearby murder of crows scattered up into the air.

Wazguttle was up on his feet. His big brow was furrowed with irritation, and his fists were clenched.

"If I 'ear one more word from yoo, Flirksmasher, just one more word…" He rolled his eyes and put on a trembling falsetto. "' _Ooo, I's Flirksmasher, an' I don't need no kotch, cos I's a speshul magical snowflake_.' Know what dat is? Dat's grot talk. Proper orc boyz don't need ter talk like dat, 'coz dey's cunnin' enuff ter to know dey can always improve."

There were a few giggles. Flirksmasher squirmed awkwardly in his seat.

"I wuz just sayin'-"

"Oh, yoo's always just sayin'. Whinin' an' poutin'. I've 'ad it up ter here, Flirksmasher!" He jabbed a finger in Edwyrd's direction. "Now dis stuntie lad-"

"Edwyrd-" said Edwyrd.

"- dis stuntie lad knows all about der game and 'ow ter win matches, an' 'e's gonna teach it to us, so yoo just shut up and listen, all right?"

Wazguttle glowered once more at Flirksmasher, gave Edwyrd a curt nod, and returned to his seat.

Edwyrd fiddled awkwardly with his pointer.

"Thank you, Waz," he said, after a while. "As I was saying. I thought we'd start off with the Eighth Caging Manoeuvre Of Ungrim Runebearer, named after the legendary dwarven Slayer - yes, Grobb?"

The little orc had raised a hand.

"Is dere gonna be a test?"

"No, this is just an informal chat. As I was saying, the Eighth Caging Manoeuvre- _yes_ , Grobb?"

"Did yoo say 'slayer?' Like, as in dem mad stunties who go 'round duffin' up trolls and giants and dragons an' such?"

"Well, yes," Edwyrd said, with a sideways glance towards Bagpipes. The big troll was staring aimlessly into the sky, his tongue lapping up out of the corner of his mouth. "Ungrim started his career with the Black Mountain Blades, before-"

"So we gonna learn ter be like them?" Grobb said. "Duffin' up dragons? Cor."

He looked impressed.

From the end of the line, Fourtooth cupped his hand, spoke a few whispered syllables, produced an arcane burst of flame to light his pipe, and gave Edwyrd a cheerful and covert wink.

"Yes," Edwyrd said. "Yes, if you practice your moves, think tactically, and work as a team, you can overcome any opponent, no matter what their size. That's the beauty of the sport."

The Oldboyz, he realised with a jolt, were listening to him intently. Their eyes were shining were excitement. Several big heads were tilted thoughtfully to one side.

He grabbed the stick of chalk and turned to the board.

"Look," he said. "Let me show you…"


	9. Chapter 9

_Shriekers_ was one of the newer chain-taverns; a jolly sort of place with fried chicken legs and giant tankards of ale, which catered to the recent influx of undead hordes by dressing all of the waitresses up in ragged black robes, daubing their faces white, and making them pretend to be banshees.

Edwyrd had never quite been able to see the appeal himself, but the tables filled with howling werewolves and drooling zombies certainly seemed to be having a good time.

He took a sip from his pint glass and examined his notes.

The Orctown Oldboyz were, he'd decided, not all that bad. At least, they wouldn't be all that bad if they could be only persuaded to keep their hands on the ball once in a while, rather than tossing away the irritating leathery thing to give themselves a better opportunity of punching their opposite number with both fists at once.

But they were good hitters, all right. An approaching freight train would have pretty much the same impact as the sight of an Oldboy, eyes glazed over in furious concentration, lumbering madly across the grass towards an opposing team.

Wasn't there a very successful Ogre team once, he asked himself, that had been persuaded to eat the ball at kick-off and then simply charge to the end-zone? And a Titan player, who wasn't even aware of the ball's existence, who was simply told by his coach to lie down flat across the pitch, flattening the referee, opposition, and all 8,000 spectators, thus allowing the coach to claim a draw?

Yes, he thought. There were possibilities here.

"Looks like a weak bloody attacking formation to me," someone said, from over his shoulder.

He glanced around.

A white-faced banshee gave him a cheerful grin. She was balancing a trayful of drinks in one hand and several packets of McMurty's Vile Bits in the other.

"You want to get a winger up front right away," she said, jabbing her free finger down at his crudely scrawled diagram. "Gives you a chance of throwing if your cage collapses."

"They haven't really mastered throwing yet," Edwyrd replied. "Or catching. They think it's a waste of good fists."

"You're a coach, then?"

"I am,' he said. 'Well...sort of. We're really only just getting started."

She nodded sympathetically.

"I'm a player," she said. "Will be, anyway, just as soon as I find a decent team. There was an Amazon try-out across town the other week, but I wasn't a fan. Wearing crop tops, sure, and necklaces of severed testicles, sure...but _both_ at once? That just seems like you're sending a mixed message."

Edwyrd blanched.

"Human team?" he suggested.

She rolled her eyes.

"They're all the same. Old-school sexism and big floppy pantaloons. ' _Sorry, love. The lads just wouldn't feel right bashing up a girl. Why don't you go into cheerleading? A few tentacles, a bit of dribbling pus...they'd go wild for you in the Wastes_.'" She grimaced. "Anyway...sorry. You don't want to hear this. Like a refill?"

"Ah!," Leopold Bruckheimer said, coming up behind her. "And maybe some of zose nuts that you, you know, have to peel?"

With a happy sigh, he squeezed himself into Edwyrd's stall; his belly bulged out over the table's edge, tarnished burgomeister's chain bouncing against the rolls of fat.

"Just another beer for me, please," Edwyrd said.

The waitress nodded.

"You got it," she said.

"Zose nuts," Bruckheimer said, appreciatively, as she left. "Very, very tasty."

He removed his monocle and began to polish it.

"So," he continued. "How iz my team, Master Potgut?"

"Kettlebelly," Edwyrd said, flinching very slightly. "Well, they're a, ah, a really good bunch, Mister Bruckheimer. Some flaws, some weaknesses - but talented players amongst them, too. The natural skill is there, so we just need to build up their technical knowledge and experience."

He slid a sheet of paper marked 'Team Planning, Vol I-XVI' across the table.

"I was thinking," he said, "that we begin with a series of friendlies against the local teams. Make it a kind of miniature tournament. Nothing at stake, nothing to lose - a chance to watch our players develop. Then, afterwards, we do some more recruiting, take on new talent, and prepare for the Clean Cup next season. If they work on their passing, they could be competitive enough to even make it past the play-offs-"

Bruckheimer slid the sheet of paper back.

" _I_ vos thinking," he said, "zat we need to go big. Dive in head-first, you know? Ze team has been...out in ze sticks for too long. Sitting on zeir hands."

"Fourtooth taught them that," Edwyrd said. "It's the only way he can stop them punching each other during the half-time break."

Bruckheimer shrugged.

"A big tournament," he continued, airily. "Something zey can really get zeir tusks into. And, you know, since ze Chaos Cup is open for applications in six weeks' time, I vos thinking…"

Edwyrd's eyes bulged.

"The Chaos Cup?" he asked, slowly.

"Yes," Bruckheimer replied. "Ze Chaos Cup. Is something wrong wiz zat?"

Edwyrd spent some time fiddling with his tankard handle before he finally plucked up the courage to say,

"Mister Bruckheimer, I apologise...but that's not a good idea."

"You zaid zey vere good," Bruckheimer pointed out, looking a little hurt.

"Yes, yes, they're good," Edwyrd admitted. "They're in a good starting place. But we need to build on that, step by step, or we won't get anywhere. The Chaos Cup is the kind of tournament where teams get, quite literally, eviscerated. I mean...didn't they use to feed losing captains to the deformed, many-fanged trophy itself?"

"Zey stopped zat last season," Bruckheimer said sulkily. "It ate a bad lizard or something."

He replaced his monocle, frowning.

"Ze thing is, Mister Potgut," he said, "I have now owned zis team for just over a year. Last season, nothing happens. No wins, no glory. Kaput. My investment, wasted. And now you are telling me, another season, and perhaps another season after zat? Perhaps zis was a mistake, is what I am thinking."

Edwyrd, immediately, felt a little guilty.

"You've made a solid investment," he said. "I really do mean that. But these things take time. Patience is key. Now, we've got a match booked in for next week, with that Halfling team...the, uh, Guzzlewit Gluttons. That'll be a fine opportunity for us to test our skills and start making really positive steps forward, as a team."

Bruckheimer gave him a slow, long stare.

"All right," he said eventually. "All right, ve do it your way. But do not hold back too much, Mister Potgut. You already lost me a great deal of money."

"I, er-"

"Two hundred guilders I bet zat ze team would tear you limb from limb at ze first practice. Two hundred guilders!"

Edwyrd said,

"I'm... _sorry_?"

A full and flowing pint was placed in front of him, spilling merrily across the table.

The waitress smiled at him.

"This one's on the house," she said. "Good luck with the team, and that."

Bruckheimer grinned, too. It almost seemed convincing.

"Indeed," he said. "What do zey say...break a leg, coach. Break a leg, or two."


	10. Chapter 10

" _When your boot hits his eye_

 _And the entrails let fly_

 _That's-a Blood Bowl._

 _When there's blood, sweat and, death_

 _And that's only the ref_

 _That's-a Blood Bowl…_ "

Edwyrd tottered in through the door of his inn room and collapsed onto the bed.

The mattress springs creaked beneath him.

He'd managed to salvage a few treasured items from home on the long journey into the heart of the Empire. A tatty poster of Balrik Farblast, signed (and singed). A picture depicting the legendary three-way brawl between the Dwarf Anvils, Dwarf Giants and Dwarf Warhammerers over an issue of copyright. And the ball from the 2051 match between the World's Edge Wanderers and the Lieck H'Resh Allsorts.

He'd been just a nipper back then; a young beardless lad, cheering at his first ever game. Front-row seats, too, the best money could buy.

And at the end of the match, when the Allsorts' captain Bertie Battering-Ram was lying crushed and twitching on the very edge of the pitch, it'd been Mjiolnir Davis who'd lifted the bloodied ball out of his brainpain, given Edwyrd a cheerful wink, and handed it to him.

Now it sat on the bedside table, punctured and flat, but still unmistakably his. A reminder of what could be achieved if you dug deep, planned well, and fixed a pair of sharpened horns to your helmet.

"The Chaos Cup," he chuckled, rolling onto his back and staring up at the ceiling. "I mean, _really_ …"


	11. Chapter 11

The tower stood alone in the darkness of the wastes.

Its stones were, to all intents and purposes, perfectly ordinary stones; except that sometimes you might catch sight of them out of the corner of your eye, and suppose that they were scaled, or feathered. and rippling, and moving.

And sometimes you might walk past a door that should not exist, to a room beyond nightmare itself - and then you'd turn back, and find that your imagination had been playing tricks upon you.

It was enough to make you paranoid, a tower like this.

The Duchess leant back against her chair.

"Melty Magrot?" she said.

The hunched figures, knelt before her, trembled in their robes.

"He sayth he'th not coming back thith theathon, milady," one of them said. "What the All-Thtarth did to hith kneecapth…"

She rolled her eyes.

"What about Rik 'The Hammer' Badruk?" she asked.

"Dead, milady."

"How can he be dead? He was alive and kicking at the end of last season."

"Torn to pieceth by fanth latht month. They tharted by thaying they jutht wanted a lock of hith hair…"

The Duchess' long taloned nails tapped against the chair rest.

"What about Gert Mandahammer?" she said. "I _know_ he survived last season. We paid him enough to turn down the Reavers' transfer offer, as well."

Two of the hunched figures exchanged glances.

"We think," one of them said, very carefully, "that the Changer of Wayth, in Hith wisdom, rewarded Gert for hith thuccess by tranthforming him into...into…"

"Into…?"

"Well, you're thitting on him, milady."

The Duchess glanced down.

"Ah," she said. "And so we find ourselves, just six weeks before registration for the Chaos Cup, without a team."

"It theemth tho, milady."

"Have riders been sent out?"

"None have returned, milady."

"And Fellorian Retch, he has not been seen?"

"No, milady."

She sighed.

"I think," she said, "I shall retire to the Chamber of the Nine Fates."


	12. Chapter 12

She sat in the darkness, wrapping her black robes about her, and prayed.

 _O Tzeentch, Changer of Ways and Master of Fortunes..._

 _...have I failed You in some way? Are You punishing me for some fault? Is this retribution for all of those long years when I kept mispronouncing Your sacred name?_

 _...or is this divine trickery, this piling-up of coincidences into an unfair and ironic fate, intended as a reward?_

 _Because let's face it, You're complicated like that._

 _Say what you like about Khorne, but at least you know what he stands for._

"Milady," someone said from behind her.

She glanced up and around.

Fellorian Retch stood in the threshold of her chamber. His pale, scarred face was shining; his mouth contorted into a grin.

He bowed low.

The Duchess rose.

"Fellorian," she said, coldly. "You were gone some time."

"I travelled many leagues, milady," her sorcerer responded, smoothly. "In the strongholds of Men, I moved as silent as a shadow, unseen. In the dread snows of Norsca, I trod the wilderness and outlasted the blizzard-"

"The _team_ , Fellorian. Have you found any replacements for the team? Because, honestly, I think we're going to have to rebuild the Horde entirely from scratch. Right now we're down to Ziney Zed Zedun blitzing on the front line, and keen though he may be, he's still a snotling."

"I did," Fellorian said, a little irritably, "on my return, notice that the Company of Honour have pulled back from their border fortresses to winter in Altdorf. Several of the nearby towns would be relatively unprotected, therefore, and ripe for plunder-"

She waved a dismissive hand at him.

"Don't be bloody silly," she said. "Get drawn into a siege, with the Cup just a few scant months away? We'd miss out on half of the pre-tournament training. Tell me about the team, man."

Fellorian sighed.

He had nothing against sports, in particular. It was just that they had a slight habit of getting in the way of your attempts to murder, manipulate, and conquer your way to the rule of a small and twisted kingdom.

"But of course," he said. "I apologise for getting distracted. I have, in fact, found you a full complement of replacement players. They're in the courtyard below, if you'd like to take a look at them."

The Duchess gave him a curious look.

"Not amateurs, I hope?" she asked. "Where did you find them, exactly?"

"Oh," Fellorian said, thinly, "I got lucky."

It would be imprudent, he'd already decided, to tell her about the dreams. She might be inclined to misinterpret them.

From somewhere far below, there was a shriek of pure terror, rapidly cut off.

"When you say a full complement," the Duchess said, raising an eyebrow, "does that mean you found substitutes as well?"

Fellorian smiled.

"Milady," he said, "You're going to have to trust me on this one - but with this team, I can't imagine substitutes will be necessary."


	13. Chapter 13

The drizzle fell around Old Ghoul's Green, and the Orctown Oldboyz assembled for their first match of the season.

Edwyrd glanced across at the opposition, huddled on the other side of the pitch, with a sense of almost proprietorial pride.

The Guzzlewit Gluttons, as far as he could tell, had no trophies to their name, aside from the Middenheim All-Around Most Worthless gift certificate last year. You couldn't have asked for a better opposition for a match like this.

A few touchdowns, he thought. A bit of prestige. We'll be able to see which players are performing best, without having to worry about anyone getting their teeth knocked out by the other side. Perhaps it'll keep Bruckheimer happy, for now.

"Coach! Coach!"

Glancing around, Edwyrd caught sight of Fourtooth, who was staggering forward across the turf, weighed down with a couple of heavy kit-bags, jumping frantically up and down.

"Coach," he yelled. "Coach! Take a look at that!"

Edwyrd followed his outstretched finger.

Approaching, with all the speed of a glacier, was something enormous; misshapen, and gnarled, autumn leaves still hanging from its branches. With a quiet, single-minded calm, it strode directly through the middle of a neighbouring pitch; the humans playing there yelled at it, attempting to kick at its great feet. It swatted them back carelessly and kept walking.

"A tree-man," Edwyrd breathed. "Where'd they get a tree-man?"

"On loan from the Faerie Foresters," Fourtooth said, wheezing heavily as he arrived on the pitch. "Swapped it for ten cauldrons of tasty casserole, the sneaky little buggers."

Some of the Oldboyz, turning from their quiet warm-up game of kick-the-Snotling, had already noticed the tree-man.

Grobb was doing a little excited dance, clapping his hands in anticipation; old Luggen, on the edge of the pitch, was scratching at his leathery chin with the calculating eye of an old connoisseur.

Edwyrd yelled at them to gather around for a huddle.

Moments later, he found himself completely engulfed by eleven enormous green bodies.

"All right," he said, trying not to breathe in, "remember your training. Bash the halflings every opportunity you get. Keep your legs together so they can't scuttle through. And no matter what happens, ignore the tree-man."

Flirksmasher growled. It was a deep, menacing growl, and it flecked Edwyrd's face with spittle.

He stood his ground.

"Ignore the tree-man," he repeated. "It'll want to grab hold of as many of you as possible; it's a trap. If you get into contact with it, get out of contact. And remember – bashing is important, but you need to bash…" He made a vague gesture. "...tactically. Get the ball to Grobb or the Dok..."

He had a thought.

"Dok," he asked, "are you going to keep using that jet-pack?"

Dok McKlowd lifted his goggles off his beady red eyes for a moment, and considered it.

"Yup," he concluded.

Edwyrd turned back to the rest of the team.

"Get the ball to Grobb," he said firmly. "And if he decides to make a run for the endzone, protect him. All right, good luck, and play well. Wazguttle, go to the referee and make the call for the coin toss-"

"Hang on, hang on," said Fourtooth, who had scuttled in through Flirksmasher's legs and who was now sitting cross-legged on the grass, smoking his pipe, "before they go in, they have to sing the Oldboyz song, isn't that right, lads? For good luck."

A few murmurs of,

"Dat's right."

"Yeah, dat's der song we sing."

Edwyrd nodded gratefully at Fourtooth.

"All right, then," he said.

He knew what the song would be, of course. It was the same song every Orc team sang, the one that echoed from every stadium and every pitch where an Orc team was playing, yelled out from a hundred thousand guttural voices.

A huge intake of breath. Edwyrd prepared himself.

"'ERE WE GO, 'ERE WE GO, 'ERE WE GO-"

The sheer volume of sound almost knocked him off his feet.

He ducked forward, wincing, trying to cover his ears, as the Oldboyz roared in unison,

"'ERE WE GO, 'ERE WE GO, 'ERE WE GO-"

He risked a look upwards. Wazguttle's eyes were closed, his hand held to his chest, as if he was overwhelmed by the sheer beauty of the song. Grobb was mumbling, his lips barely moving, glancing shiftily from side to side; Edwyrd couldn't help but suspect that he'd forgotten the words.

"'ERE WE GO, 'ERE WE GO...'ERE WE GO."

The tune came abruptly to a halt, much to Edwyrd's relief. He'd watched matches where the Orc team had continued to sing it right through the referee's starting whistle.

"All right," he shouted, his eardrums ringing. "Go get 'em, lads,"

His team, with a collective howl of delight, turned and pounded past him towards the halfway line.

"Stirring speech," Fourtooth said, from the ground. "Of course, you don't want to be _too_ stirring, you'll get them riled up. Last coach did that once and they all charged off without waiting for the match to start. Beat the opposition to a pulp in their dressing-room. It would've been the best victory of the season too," he sighed, "if the referee hadn't disallowed it."

They strolled back to the little wooden spectator's stand and took their seats. On the pitch, Wazguttle had won the toss and was celebrating by shaking the frightened referee up and down.

Edwyrd gazed in consternation at the deserted places.

"Don't we have any fans?" he asked. "Waz, we want to receive – RECEIVE! Put him down! Good orc!"

Fourtooth licked his lips thoughtfully.

"There was a big rock," he said, "that used to be always lying around when we played here. Every match, regular as clockwork. The lads all thought it was dead loyal."

"What happened to it?"

"It didn't turn up to one of our away games, so Krumpface and Dik Der Cunnnin' smashed it up with a couple of hammers to teach it a lesson. The next day a couple of dwarves turned up and took away the pieces to their quarry. Sad, really."

Edwyrd felt a sticky, unpleasant sensation against his palm. He glanced down.

Squiggie paused to give him a big toothy smile, then continued to lick his hand.

"OK," he said to himself. There was, he noted, a slight tremor in his voice - nerves, perhaps, or excitement? "Nuffle be kind, please. Nuffle be kind."


	14. Chapter 14

The whistle blew. A tiny halfling stumbled up to the ball and kicked at it, tumbling several feet forward in the process.

Most of the Oldboyz watched it fall. Luggen, with the consummate tactical instincts of a veteran, had already punched his opposite number in the kidneys and stamped on their head.

Seconds later, the ball hit the turf; far back, close to the Oldboyz' touchline.

Grobb stared at it for a moment, his neurons slowly firing into life, and then lurched towards it. Several of the halflings were already streaking forward, tumbling through the Orcs' legs with practised ease.

"Yes!" Edwyrd shouted, excitedly. "Yes, Grobb! Get the ball upfield!"

Grobb, hearing his name called, stopped and turned. Spotting Edwyrd, he gave him a little wave.

"No!" Edwyrd screamed, jabbing his finger. "The ball! The ball!"

Grobb turned, stooped and picked it up just as a squat halfling dived to intercept, immediately bouncing off the orc's right knee. There was a nasty cracking noise.

Grobb stared at the prone body at his feet, shrugged, and began to lurch forward. Near the halfway line, Dik Der Cunnin' had unwisely chosen to attack the tree-man and was even now being dangled ten feet in the air by his ankle and slammed against the ground.

"Good luck, by the way," someone said, by Edwyrd's ear. He turned.

The halfling coach gave him a cheerful nod, and began to unwrap his sandwich.

"Oh," Edwyrd said, smiling. "Well, good luck to you too."

A moment of amiable silence followed. Edwyrd decided to build on it.

"You know, I've heard of such bad behaviour amongst the professional coaches," he said, leaning across. "But it's nice to meet someone who can coach competitively and still understand the importance of decency, sportsmanship and respect-"

On-field, Flirksmasher knocked over a halfling. The little fellow's leg snapped in two.

The halfling coach threw down his sandwich, turned to Edwyrd, and spat,

"You're using an injury-generating wizard, aren't you, dwarf? AREN'T YOU?"

Edwyrd said,

"Er, no."

He glanced across to Fourtooth, who shrugged.

A sudden shriek from onfield; Grobb had somehow managed to trip over his own legs, sending the ball tumbling out over the field, where it halted against the prone body of a fallen halfling. Four Oldboyz leapt into the fray. For a moment, there was only confusion.

And then Wazguttle leapt clear, a tiny receptacle clutched beneath his arm. Two of his teammates ran with him, ready to block the scant defence. Someone slipped. A halfling squealed.

Wazguttle kept running, his big legs pounding away across the grass, until he reached the endzone, smashing his cargo triumphantly into the ground and roaring in celebration. The rest of the Orcs charged forward, pumping their fists and cheering.

Edwyrd's screams of,

"No! No!" went unheard.

Beneath Wazguttle's fist, a dazed little halfling groaned and rolled out of the endzone soil. At the other end of the pitch, the Gluttons, toddling across the Oldboyz' abandoned half with the ball, scored a touchdown.

The halfling coach turned back to Edwyrd, jabbed a finger, and jeered,

"Yeah! YEAH! Learn to play, morons! _Yee_ -ha!"

Edwyrd sat, his head in his hands.


	15. Chapter 15

When the half-time whistle blew, the Oldboyz came trudging despondently back across to the stand and stood there in silence as Fourtooth handed out orange halves.

"'E really did look like der ball," Wazguttle said at last. "'E was round and everyfing."

"You were doing well out there," Fourtooth said soothingly. "Just...try to concentrate more, keep your eye on the ball. Ain't that right, coach?"

Edwyrd did not reply.

Flirksmasher snarled,

"'Oo needs der ball, anyhow? We smashed a stuntie's kneecap and broke anuffer's 'ead. Dat's what we do! _Dat_ 's why we're winnin'! Right? Right?"

There was a general roar of approval.

"No," said Edwyrd, in a small, sad voice.

Heads turned.

He gazed out over his team.

"Bashing is a tactic, gentlemen," he said, "but it isn't the _game_. Bashing means nothing if you can't get hold of that ball and run for your life for the opposition endzone. Bash at the wrong time or in the wrong place, and you've left a gap they can exploit. And bashing," he conceded, "may feel good; it may feel great, to knock your opponent down and leave him twitching on the floor, but it is nothing, _nothing_ , compared to the sensation of touching that ball down in the grass. Of looking back across eleven of your fiercest enemies, and thinking, 'I've beaten all of you. I've outfought you, I've outsmarted you, I've outran you, and I've outplayed you.'

He smiled to himself.

"When you feel like that," he added, quietly, "you know what it means to be a god. What it means to be a Blood Bowl player."

The Oldboyz, as one, stared at him.

Flirksmasher spat.

"More elf talk," he said. "I've 'eard enough of-"

 **CRACK.**

Flirksmasher stumbled, tripped, and fell. He gazed up, a hand raised to his cheek, astonished.

Wazguttle gazed calmly down at him. His giant fist was still clenched.

"Dat's der kotch yer talkin' to, Flirk," he said. "An' 'e was trying to teach yer sumfink dat _mattered_. When 'e speaks, yoo listen. An' when yoo talk to him, yoo call him 'kotch'. Got it?"

Flirksmasher's mouth opened and closed a couple of times.

Then he said,

"Sure, Waz."

"Now, what do yoo say ter him?"

The big Black Orc gazed helplessly up at Edwyrd.

"...sorry," he managed.

"...sorry, kotch."

"... _sorry_ , kotch."

Fourtooth gave Edwyrd a sideways glance, and said,

"Waz, why don't you help Flirksmasher up? Whistle's blown. And the referee's waiting for you. Time to get back out on the pitch, I think."

Wazguttle grunted, and extended a hand. Flirksmasher hesitated for a moment before taking it, then hoisted himself back up onto his feet.

Edwyrd took a deep breath.

"All right," he said. "They're up one touchdown, but they're down two players. We can take advantage of that. Thin them out, keep them pinned down wherever you can, and spread to the wings where they can't follow you. We can do this."

He hesitated before adding,

"And my personal MVP goes to whoever kicks one of those little bastards the farthest in the next forty minutes."

A chorus of chuckles.

Edwyrd yelled,

" _Go get them_!"


	16. Chapter 16

The whistle blew. And the ball went soaring out, bouncing into the Gluttons' half.

Dok McKlowd stared solemnly at it. His hand worked its way around to the big lever affixed to the back of his jetpack.

"Ter infinity," he muttered beneath his breath, "an'…an'...an' some uvver places too."

The ensuing explosion set three halflings alight. The Dok was carried off by two of his teammates and placed in the stands.

"You all right, Dok?" Fourtooth asked, sponging his forehead.

The orc grinned.

"I'm still flyin', right?" he said. "Mus' be, I can see all der stars..."

He passed out.

Edwyrd opened his pocket watch and checked it, nervously.

The second half was running down fast, and they were still one-nil down. Worse, to his horror, the match on the neighbouring pitch had come to an end, and a couple of human supporters had trailed over and were now sitting curiously on the stand beside him.

One of them nudged him.

"What's the score, then?" she asked.

"I really have no idea," Edwyrd said.

A moment passed before it occurred to him that the Gluttons' coach hadn't spoken up to brag about their touchdown. He glanced across to his left.

The halfling's seat was empty, save for a half-eaten sandwich.

In the darkness beneath the stand, Squiggie belched loudly.

"Best mascot we've ever had," said Fourtooth. " I swear to Sigmar, he really is."

"Go on, son!" one of the human supporters shouted.

Edwyrd looked up.

Luggen had the ball under his arm and was dashing for the endzone. In his path stood the imposing bulk of the tree-man.

Dodge it, Edwyrd prayed, please, please, dodge it.

The tree-man swung its branch in the orc's direction. Luggen hopped into the air, too late, surely, impossibly too late-

And then the branch had missed, uselessly thwacking into the earth as Luggen dived for the line-

Touchdown.

The referee's whistle blew. Edwyrd's heartbeat thudded.

Touchdown.

And as Luggen rose from the ground, he turned to the stands, looked Edwyrd dead in the eye, and gave him a single, curt, nod of acknowledgement.


	17. Chapter 17

As the full-time whistle blew, Edwyrd got to his feet, beaming with pride and excitement.

Fourtooth took his hand.

"Bloody well done," he said. "1-1. Not bad at all. You know, I didn't think we were going to come back from that first half?"

"Neither did I," Edwyrd admitted. He shook his head delightedly. "You know, that really was something. Really something."

Fourtooth grinned.

"Feels good, don't it?" he said.

Onfield, the Oldboyz finished politely applauding the scattered bodies of opponents, and began to rumble over towards the stand.

Grobb was still punching the air.

"Kotch!" he yelled, "we won, kotch! We won!"

The cry was taken up by the rest of the team.

"Well," Edwyrd said, awkwardly, "not quite. We drew."

Fourtooth nudged him.

"Probably best not to correct them," he said.

Someone tapped on Edwyrd's shoulder. He turned around.

One of the human supporters was smiling down at him.

"Excuse me," he asked, "...but what's your team called, again?"


	18. Chapter 18

It was close to the midnight curfew, and the party showed little sign of stopping.

"All right," Edwyrd said, sloshing beer down his front. "All right, all right, all right. Explain it to me again."

Wazguttle put a friendly arm around his shoulders.

"Gork," he said, slurringly, "iz der, uh, der god o' brutal cunnin'."

"Got it."

"But Mork, he's der god o' cunnin' brutality."

"I do not," Edwyrd confessed, "entirely understand the difference."

Wazguttle shrugged.

"It a matter," he said, "o' sum theological contenshun."

"OK," a fat man in graveyard rags said, distributing platters across the table. "That's eight large Snot Green Pizzas, two Mighty Morkys, a bucket of Gnoblar Dippers, Elf Fries, and a small Pepperoni. I make that eighteen guilders, plus another three for your squig who keeps throwing up shoes all over the counter."

"Sorry about him," Edwyrd said, reaching for his wallet. "He rather over-indulged today."

A thought occurred to him.

"Is that human waitress still working here?" he asked. "She was a Blood Bowl player. Trying to get into a team."

The man snorted.

"Cress?" he said. "Yeah, she's well outta here. Gone to sign up with some team out in the sticks. Her loss, you know? I told her, 'There may be glamour in professional sports, kiddo, and there may be glory. But you don't get to eat up the leftover tortilla chips after the customers have gone home.' Know what I mean?"

"I really, really don't," Edwyrd said.

Curiously, he felt a little disappointed. It would have been nice, he thought, to have confided in someone just how well his first match as a professional coach had gone.

He glanced across the table to Luggen.

The old orc was jammed in between Bob Blacktooth and Krumpface, his pint of fungus brew untouched beside him, staring dully into empty space.

Edwyrd leant forward to get his attention.

"Hells of a touchdown," he said, tilting his glass.

Luggen nodded non-committally.

"So tell me," Edwyrd said, "where'd you learn to run like that? I don't think I've ever seen an orc with those sorts of moves."

Luggen turned to face him.

The light caught the enormous scar running from his forehead all of the way down to his cheek. His eyes were glowing with something stronger than anger, more pitiless than hatred.

"From me last team," he said.


	19. Chapter 19

A tankard hit the wall and shattered.

" _And dey call it grotty love,_

 _Dat's why dey'll never know_

 _How der young voice yells out Waaagh!_

 _And der elves all go Aaarghblaarghaaargh…"_

Edwyrd yelled,

"I love this song!"

Fourtooth, who was face down in a bowl of coleslaw, did not respond.

"Orc music. I swear, if you'd told me three weeks ago I'd be singing orc music, I'd have laughed at you! Laughed at you! But it just feels like a fit, you know? It feels right. It feels…"

"Destined to be?" someone said, from above him.

Leopold Bruckheimer stood over the table, beaming, clapping his fat hands slowly together.

Slowly, the Oldboyz noticed him. Their song trailed to a halt.

"A victory, I hear," he continued. "Well done, indeed."

"Actually..." Edwyrd began, and then thought better of it.

Bruckheimer patted him warmly on the head.

"Well, coach," he said, "do you still think your team iz not ready for ze Chaos Cup?"

Edwyrd suddenly became aware that all eyes were on him.

"I...uh…" he said.

"Der...Chaos Cup," Flirksmasher said, slowly. "Like..der real fing? Wiv der Orcland Raiders dere an' everyfing?"

Bruckheimer rummaged in his coat pocket and produced a ragged sheet of paper.

"I haf prepared an itinerary for you," he said, brightly. "Wiz a series of friendly matches en route. Plenty of time for your boys to gain valuable practice along ze way, and arrive in time for registration. I can't vait to see how you get on!"

Edwyrd felt the blood beginning to drain away from his face.

"I'm not sure…" he mumbled, "I'm not sure this is such a…"

He looked down at Fourtooth for support, but the Bright Wizard appeared to be fast asleep in the coleslaw. Bubbles were sporadically rising from the surface of the mayonnaise.

"Dere's all kindsa great players at der Chaos Cup," Grobb chimed in. "Urgash Axe-Biter. Trok Elfsplitter. Cor! I could meet Gorbag 'Rabid' Foamface and everyfink!"

"And der rewards," Krumpface added, pawing the table. "Just fink about it. If we wuz ter win...der contracts, der advertising partnerships. All der women we could eat! We'd be famous, right? Famous!"

There was a low, thrilling collective murmur of excitement.

"So..." Wazguttle said, with a kind of disbelieving rapture, "Is we goin' to der Chaos Cup, then, kotch? Is dis actually happenin'?"

"I mean...," Edwyrd continued, feebly. "Look, I don't know if we're ready, Waz. We...we need to..."

"Nonsense," shouted Bruckheimer. He raised his fat arms high in celebration. "I zink you're ready! Ready for anyzink! Do you zink you're ready, lads?"

The answering roar was deafening.

And from out of it grew a chant,

 _"Chaos Cup! Chaos Cup! Chaos Cup!"_

Wazguttle grasped Edwyrd around the neck and gave him a friendly throttle.

"Wiv you at der helm, kotch," Grobb yelled, punching the air, "we can't lose! Chaos Cup! Chaos Cup!"

Edwyrd blanched. Wazguttle's grip around his neck was extremely tight.

"Yes..." he muttered, trying to smile. "Chaos Cup. Chaos Cup."


	20. Chapter 20

Elsewhere, hundreds of miles to the east, a boy was celebrating his eleventh birthday.

There was nothing particularly strange about that, particularly in a nation that had been accustomed to churning out generations of young men, in a heroic but ultimately doomed attempt to prevent the endless, bloody and pointless wars of our time from fizzling out due to a lack of sustainable resource.

And, indeed, there was nothing particularly interesting about this boy. He had not been born on a dark and stormy night. No mysterious strangers had abandoned him on any doorstep. No prophecies had been sung about his birth.

That was pretty remarkable in itself, actually. When every village and every town on the continent was packed with necromancers, soothsayers, doomspeakers, sibyls, seers, haruspices and sages, most of the population had at some point been the subject of a prophecy, even if it was only along the lines of 'Jacob, Yea, The One Who Shall Someday Arise To Finally Fix That Leaky Pipe Beneath Mrs Tralagar's Combi-Boiler.'

But Damien Nush, it seemed, was too unpredictable - or just too ordinary - for destiny to be bothered with. He simply arrived, in the form of a Spawn FreeTM Pregnancy Kit that turned pink one midsummer morning, unexpected and unplanned for.

If his parents had been particularly thoughtful or reflective types, they might have read something into that. But instead, Mister and Mrs Nush had shared a small glass of Moot champagne, congratulated each other on a successful conception, and given no more thought to the nature of Damien's provenance.

Until today.

Mister Nush, who in small business terms ranked somewhere between a vassal and a thrall (never actually asked to make the tea, but never asked if he'd like any, either), lowered his copy of the Middenheim Herald and said,

"Where d'you think he gets it from?"

Mrs Nush, who was on her fifth glass of cough medicine today, gave him a slightly dreamy look.

"Hm?"

"Where does he get it from, I said? Staring at that bloody Cabalvision box all day long."

"I wouldn't know, dear," said Mrs Nush.

"Not from me," Mister Nush barked. "I can tell you that. In my day, we didn't spend our afternoons watching nonsense on that infernal machine. We were out in the fields, with pike and lance, fighting for emperor and country at the Battle of the Galzburg Plains. I remember, I was-"

He hesitated.

Now he came to think of it, he couldn't remember what he'd been doing at the Battle of Galzburg Plains. There'd been a great deal of shouting, and other people in similar uniforms jostling him, and occasionally falling over, and gunpowder smoke.

There'd been a hated enemy, he remembered that much, because the officers kept shouting about them. But in the end, they'd been mostly silhouettes, some distance away across the battlefield, occasionally falling over.

"...I'm not saying I want that for Damien," he concluded. "Not one bit. But dammit, he just _sits_ there. Like it's all beneath him."

"Oh, that's a pity," Mrs Nush said, cheerfully. She hadn't dreamt of divorce for at least three glasses now.

"Right," Mister Nush said, setting his paper down. "I'm going to talk to him."

"That's nice," said Mrs Nush, staring into the middle distance.


	21. Chapter 21

"Damien," Mister Nush said. "Damien, turn that off, son. I want to talk to you."

His son sat cross-legged in front of the Cabalvision box and did not respond.

Onscreen, the Athelorn Avengers appeared to be losing to the Darkside Cowboys.

Mister Nush reached for the remote and switched it off.

Damien turned around.

His eyes were silver, and shining, and nothing like his mother's. Or his father's, either, if it came to it.

"Hello, Dad," he said.

"Damien," Mister Nush snapped, "we've had enough of it. Enough, d'you hear?"

"Enough of what, Dad?"

"Enough of you sat in front of that blasted game, that's what. Your mother and I are both very worried about you - _aren't we, Elsa_?"

"Mmm?" Mrs Nush said, vaguely, from the kitchen.

"It's time you found yourself a proper hobby, my lad. Something healthy, something active. Whether it's tilling the fields or crawling dungeons, you're old enough to get out of the house and discover what you're _really_ passionate about."

Damien watched him, head tilted to one side.

" _Really_ passionate about?" he asked, softly.

Mister Nush stared deep into those extraordinary silver eyes - and felt his courage falter.

"Just...not in front of that box, son," he said. "We can make it your birthday present, if you like. Whatever you like. It's just not healthy for you to be cooped up like this."

Damien turned back towards the black void of the deactivated Cabalvision screen. He seemed to be considering.

"All right, Dad," he said. "Since you mention it...I think I'd like to see a match up close."

"A...Blood Bowl match?" Mister Nush asked, hopelessly.

"That's right," said Damien. "Out in the open air. Nice and healthy, Dad. It's the Chaos Cup soon, I believe."

"Right," said Mister Nush. Somehow, he felt, he'd rather lost control of this conversation. "Right. Of course. It's just that - son - those tickets are quite expensive. And you know, maybe you'd prefer a nice jousting tourney, or a pit fight-"

"The Chaos Cup," Damien said, and turned to face his father.

Those silver eyes, those strange silver eyes, could swallow the world.

"Yes," said Mister Nush, quite hypnotised. "All right, then. I'll see what I can do."

His son smiled.

"Thanks, Dad," he said. "You're the best."


	22. Chapter 22

The news had spread; the Chaos Cup was fast approaching.

All about the town, husbands kissed their wives goodbye and coaches yelled themselves hoarse looking for a cart willing to travel the many leagues north. The horse-dealer was already doing a roaring trade. And in the ascetic monastery to Sigmar, twenty novices broke down their own gates from within using a home-made battering ram and fled, the colours of the Skavenblight Scramblers painted over their tonsures.

The Orctown Oldboyz assembled just after dawn, outside the rugged cave network cut into the nearby hillside that the team called home.

Edwyrd, wrapped in a blanket in the front of one of their hired wagons, counted up their supplies and shook his head in agitation.

"The Chaos sodding Cup," he moaned, softly. "I don't get it. I don't get it at all. How could you possibly think this was a sensible idea? I mean, what was Bruckheimer _thinking_?"

"Could be," Fourtooth said, "that he's sensed our true potential and seeks to push us to truly be all that we can be."

He stared vaguely into the dawnlight.

"Alternatively," he added, "it could have something to do with that insurance policy he asked me to help him fill out last week."

Edwyrd buried his head in his hands.

Fourtooth gave him a reassuring pat on the back.

"Relax, coach," he said. "Like you already told him, they're just not ready. So they'll crash out in the qualifiers, gain a few bruises in the process, and we can all go home safe and sound. We won't even get to the nasty stuff. Right?"

"Right," Edwyrd said. "You're right. Of course."

Get a grip, he told himself. He's right. Of course he is. This will be a learning experience. Nothing more.

Wazguttle sauntered over to the cart and gave a vague salute.

"Coupla fings, kotch," he said. "Nummer one...dem fings. Four-leg fings. Uhh. Four-leg one-tail fings."

He snapped his fingers vaguely.

"The horses, you mean?" Edwyrd asked.

Wazguttle nodded.

"Right. Dey're too small. Dey ain't gonna carry none of us all der way to ter Cup."

He had a point. Bruckheimer had clearly skimped on the expenses when it came to the team's transportation; the carts were rickety and frail, and the ponies at the reins were skinny creatures that eyed up the enormous orcs surrounding them with an air of panic.

"Fing, uh, two," Wazguttle said, "it Badpipes."

"Badpipes?" Edwyrd asked.

"Der troll."

"Oh."

"Badpipes gone shamblabout," Wazguttle continued. "We dunno where 'e's gone."

Edwyrd attempted some mental translation.

"Shamblabout," he said. "You mean...like walkabout?"

"Yoo's 'it der nail on der goblin's 'ead," said Wazguttle. "We fink e'll just follow our smell all der way to der tournament, though."

He gave Edwyrd a confiding wink.

"I bin tellin' 'im that if we win der Chaos Cup, 'e gets ter eat yoo," he added. "So I fink 'e'll be back soon enuff. Anyway, just fort yoo shud know."

"Fantastic," Edwyrd said, a little weakly.

Wazguttle nodded cheerfully and wandered off.

"One player down already," Edwyrd muttered.

He gazed out over the endless hills and moors of the landscape ahead, veiled in morning fog.

"And who knows how many of us will be left by the end?" he added, half to himself.


	23. Chapter 23

Luggen sat back as the cart pulled away. He glanced around twice to make sure nobody was looking at him, and then unfolded the sheet of paper he'd cut out of SPIKE Magazine.

He'd managed to decipher the article title, with some help from Fourtooth. And now he repeated it to himself, over and over, turning the words about in his head with a quiet agitation.

MOTLEY HORDE SETS OUT FOR CHAOS CUP. MOTLEY HORDE SETS OUT FOR CHAOS CUP.

The sketch below the squiggly words, he believed, was supposed to depict the Horde itself. A shambling assembly of all sorts of creatures – orcs, pointy-ears, dwarves – and, standing in their centre, a pair of humans. One female, dressed in black robes, and one male, bald and scowling.

It wasn't a particularly good likeness.

Luggen folded the sheet of paper up again between his four great fingers with surprising care, deposited it beneath his breastplate, and went back to sleep.

Edwyrd, sitting in the cart in front, was composing a letter. He scrawled, quickly, using the slumbering Dik Der Cunnin's back as a desk.

"My dearest Father. I write with Glad Tidings, I'Faith-"

Crossed out.

"Dad. Guess who has his very own Blood Bowl team? It's the very same dwarf who you said was, and I quote, 'pursuing a fool's errand for the sake of some ridiculous hobby'-"

Crossed out.

There was a slight shuffling sound, and Dok McKlowd pulled himself up alongside Edwyrd.

The rank stench of fungus brew and explosive chemicals followed the little orc about, as always.

"Mmm?" Edwyrd said, glancing around. "Oh, sorry, Dok – I was just writing a-"

He looked down towards what was clutched in Dok's grubby hands.

A scarf. A woollen knitted scarf, in three colours; blue, white and black.

"Is that...for me?" Edwyrd asked.

"Yup," said the Dok.

Edwyrd reached out and touched it, reverently. It was incredibly soft.

"Did you...knit it yourself?"

"Yup."

"How?"

"Yup."

Edwyrd wrapped it snugly over his chainmail and around his neck.

"Today I'm a real member of this team," he said. "Thank you, Dok."

Dok McKlowd gibbered excitedly and clapped his hands.


	24. Chapter 24

Just outside Marienburg, they cooked and ate the horses, and the Oldboyz took turns at pulling the carts.

By midday, the road had become a trail, and the rolling fields had transformed into fog-ridden mire.

Edwyrd gave their surroundings an uneasy look.

"We can't stop here," he said aloud. "This is bandit country."

Several of the Oldboyz gave him a startled look, then stood up and began to scan the horizon expectantly.

"Actually," he added, "I meant that as a negative."

"Let 'em hope, coach," Fourtooth said. "It's been a quiet couple of days." He glanced over Edwyrd's shoulder. "Workin' on the strategy?"

"If you can call it that," said Edwyrd. He frowned. "We're just lacking something key here. We've got the size, we've definitely got the punching power...but we're not going to be competitive unless we can diversify our tactics. We've got a need for...well…"

"OOOOOOOSSSSHHHHHHHH-"

Something streaked past his shoulder.

He looked up.

A young woman was pelting out across the trail, her arms and legs whirring, travelling at quite incredible speed.

A moment later, a man waving a sword ran after her.

"Catch her!" he yelled. "Nobody trespasses in the territory of Roberto the Bandit and lives!"

He stopped and stared at the three cartfuls filled with orcs.

The orcs stared back at him.

"I mean," he squeaked, "we can always make exceptions."

He hesitated, and then turned and ran back the way he came.

Wazguttle reached lazily out of the cart, picked Roberto the Bandit up, and shook him until bits fell off. Then he threw him at one of the other bandits, who had hesitated further back along the trail and seemed to be wondering if now was a good time to begin to flee.

There was a creak as the rest of Oldboyz stretched, cracked their knuckles, and got to their feet.

Edwyrd watched the ensuing melee, occasionally wincing or muttering, "Oh, oh, oh, no," under his breath.

Fourtooth blew smoke rings, kicked off his shoes, and began to waggle his toes.

A few minutes later, the fight had reached its natural conclusion. Orcs are easily bored and tend to have little interest in objects that unaccountably fail to fight back.

The Oldboyz began to wander back to the carts, oblivious to the human woman who was even now kicking Roberto the Bandit's remnants in what were probably once its nads, over and over, while snapping,

"Take that, you little bastards, take that, take that-"

There was a distinct cracking sound.

"Er, miss?" Edwyrd said, getting nervously to his feet. "Miss?"

She glanced up, and brightened.

"Oh, hello," she said, stepping forward over the bandit's twitching corpse. "The dwarf from the bar, isn't it? The Blood Bowl coach?"

"That's right," said Edwyrd. "Edwyrd Kettlebelly. And that makes you, um…"

"Cressida. Cressida D'Arth."

Smiling, she swept her bloodstreaked silver hair out from across her face, then glanced down at the remains of Roberto's thugs.

"Look," she said. "Not to be a pain...but I don't suppose you've got room in those carts for a small one?"


	25. Chapter 25

On the windswept and misty heaths of the north-eastern reaches of the Empire, occasional travellers wandered, clad only in rags and carrying only crude staffs. Hounded by snarling dire wolves and shivering with the frost, desperately seeking some, any kind of human torchlight shining in the windows of a crude habitation, and the smell of fresh food wafting up from smoking chimneys.

When they arrived at Schwarzkopf, they usually said something like,

"Um…"

"Interesting place," said Edwyrd, gazing admiringly at the architecture. He'd never been in a human town before where he didn't actually have to look up. "Lots of character. I like how the flying buttresses on the church look like they're actually flying."

"Are they meant to splinter like that?" Fourtooth asked, tilting his head.

Cressida, hopping down from the wagon, said,

"I grew up in a little place like this. The pigs ate the cabbage and we ate the pigs. And then fertilised the cabbage. It wasn't much of a life if you were vegetarian and you wanted to achieve more than just bowel movements." She checked her scrap of paper. "Anyway, this is where my team should be having sign-ups."

"They'll probably be in the tavern," Edwyrd said. He nodded towards what appeared to be a particularly impressive pile of unconstituted lumber and peat, set into the nearby hillside. A swinging sign above read,

'THE WARM WELCOME (NO ELVES, VAMPIRES, GOBLINS, GNOBLARS, OGRES, TROLLS, GHOULS, ZOMBIES, FESTERING NURGLINGS OR TIME-WASTERS)'

"Hells of a fine print," Fourtooth muttered, squinting.

Wazguttle was standing at the front door, peering down and inside.

"Waz, go in and get us some rooms," Edwyrd called.

"'K."

"And keep a low profile, all right? We don't want any bother while we're here."

Wazguttle gave him a thumbs-up. He reached up, removed his helmet, and ran a hand through his shock of hair. As if trying it out for the first time, he gave a big, warm, non-threatening smile.

Then he turned and walked through the tavern door, bringing down a large portion of the roof and walls in a cloud of furious dust.


	26. Chapter 26

"-I told you," the barman was explaining frantically. "We don't have any rooms left-"

Wazguttle gave him a bemused look.

Then he reached up over the bar and lifted the poor man up and out by his shoulders, lifting him up until they were face-to-face.

"I's SAID," he repeated, loudly and slowly, as if speaking to a deaf person, "firteen single rooms, one basket fer Squiggie, an' a round of ales, PLEASE."

"I won't be shaken down!" the barman squeaked, struggling to get loose.

"Shaken up, perhaps," said Fourtooth, stepping through the remains of the doorway. "He ain't trying to extort you, mister. Orcs don't have the imagination. He's just trying to be disarming."

"Take 'is arms off, yoo said?" Wazguttle asked politely.

Fourtooth lit his pipe.

"Not just yet, mate," he said. "Not until we've got thirteen rooms, one basket for Squiggie, and a round of ales. Please."

The barman moaned softly.

"But there's no room!" he whispered. "I keep telling you, we just don't have any-"

"I saw some lumber in the woods a little way back," said Fourtooth.

He grinned. If you could call it a grin, with quite such a noticeable absence of molars.

"The boys will lend you a hand with the building of it, of course," he added. "Just a bit of an extension on the west wing. Shouldn't take 'em too long, and they'll do it all pro bono, as well."

"I should do _wot_ to 'is bones?"

"Put him down, Waz," said Fourtooth. "Nice and gentle, mate. I think we're going to be made very welcome while we're in town."


	27. Chapter 27

"Hi," Cressida said, brightly.

She dumped her bag down on the tavern table.

"I'm here to try out for the position of runner," she explained. "Cressida D'Arth, that's D with an apostrophe-"

"Yeah, right, love," said the captain of the Eregstorm Eagles. On either side of him, two identically smirking men sat with their arms crossed, dressed in the same patchy gold-and-green uniform. "Go on, get outta here."

Cressida raised an eyebrow.

"Excuse me?"

"We ain't taking on no girly-girls, I said."

"Yeah."

"That's right."

"But I…" she glowered at them. "But I've come all this way. And I _have_ the talent."

"Don't matter nuffing to us, sweetheart." He leered at her. "It's called line _man_ , ain't it? Not linelady."

"Blitz _er_ , not blitzerella."

"Blood _Bowl_ , not...uh...actually, that one does work."

The captain glared vaguely to his left.

"Listen, sweetheart," he said, leaning forward. "I think I can see what's goin' on here. You got a stirring in your loins for a bit of Eagle beak, right? Nothing wrong with that. And I'm sure we'd, uhh, be willing to accommodate you. But you don't need to try and impress us by acting like you can play Blood Bowl, now, do you?"

"Yeah."

"We're actually not all that picky."

Cressida gave them a sweet smile.

"I see," she said. "Here's my rebuttal."


	28. Chapter 28

Edwyrd stared into his pint.

"...so then you shook down the barman," he said.

"Not shook down," Fourtooth replied, cheerfully. "Him and me and Waz, we had a business arrangement."

The Oldboyz had, in a matter of hours, transformed the tavern. A large new eastern wing, complete with sizeable if crudely constructed rooms, now stood to one side, while the main bar room itself had been expanded outwards and upwards.

The barman was standing behind his new bar, giving everyone frightened looks and flinching whenever anyone approached.

"I just…" Edwyrd said. He hesitated. "I don't want this to become life for us. Visit new places, meet new people, and then punch their faces in. The team needs to learn when it's appropriate to be _civil._ "

Fourtooth nodded towards the circle of orcs in the middle of the tavern floor.

"Thing is, coach," he said. "The boys, they're incredible, they really are. Get 'em onside and you'll never find a more loyal team. But you, _now_...you need to learn to accept the things you can't change. Orcs are creatures of chaos, with a small 'c'. And they're simple. Fighting's like a first language to 'em."

"What, so I should just let them-"

"Yes," Fourtooth said. "Yes, you should. The next time they get into shenanigans, you just try smiling, shrugging your shoulders, and saying, ' _Here we go again!_ '."

Edwyrd stared at him.

"Here we go again," he said miserably.

" _Here we go again!_ "

"Here we go again."

"That's the spirit," Fourtooth said, and drained his pint.

"How do you stay so laid-back all the time?" Edwyrd asked. "Honestly, it's astonishing."

The Bright Wizard smiled softly.

"Mate," he said. "I'm older than you are. I used to fight in the endless wars. I saw entire regiments of terrified peasants torn apart by ravening daemons from the Warp itself. I lost people I loved to chittering rat-men, watched good men and women being devoured by ravenous hellhounds. I have understood that there is no end but death, and the pain that comes before it."

He stared vaguely into space for a little while.

"Once you've been through that," he added, "you have to make a choice. Get busy living, or get busy necromancing."

Across the room, Cressida grabbed a small man in green-and-gold livery from across a table and headbutted him, hard.

There was a crack.

The Eregstorm Eagles got to their feet.

With a rumble of excitement, the Oldboyz got to theirs.

" _Here we go again_!" Fourtooth said, from beneath the table.

In situations like these, everyone knows what's supposed to happen next. Someone yells, "Bar fight!". Then someone tries to punch the nearest drinker in the face, but misses and hits someone else. Glasses are thrown. One crafty opportunist hides under the kegs and starts drinking direct from the tap.

Tonight, however, the assembled clientele took one look at the Oldboyz and, as one, made a concerted effort to climb out of the windows to safety.

"Bar fight!" Grobb said hopefully. He was ignored.

Cressida rose from out of the wreckage of the table, cracking her neck thoughtfully. The remaining Eagles observed her, warily, but did not move.

"You see," she said, to nobody in particular, "when I said 're _butt_ al', I really meant that I was going to headbutt- ouch."

Edwyrd tried to catch the eye of the barman.

"It's OK," he shouted. "We're not causing any trouble here. No fights, no threats. Nothing to worry about-"

There was a loud splintering noise from behind him that might well have been a brand-new eastern wing collapsing in on itself.


	29. Chapter 29

The Oldboyz lined up on the snowy Schwarzkopf field.

"Not bad," Edwyrd said, cheerfully, picking up the ball and tossing it up into the air. "Really not a bad practice at all, lads. We should be well set for tomorrow when we play the university team."

A row of blank green faces.

"Er, that's a sort of place where you learn things," he added quickly. "Learn things. Like - you know what, it doesn't really matter. What I'd really like to see, though, is a little more speed on the wings. Grobb's doing great, but Dok…unless you can get that jetpack a little more, er, consistent, we might have to consider jettisoning it for this match."

Dok McKlowd's face lit up.

"Oh, fanks, kotch!" he said.

"That means we might have to not use it," Edwyrd explained.

Dok McKlowd's face sank.

"Our main problem is," Edwyrd continued, "that you lot are great at hitting things. Nobody's disputing that. But…if something's moving faster than you, how do you get to it in order to hit it?"

"Frow somefing at it," Dik Der Cunnin' muttered.

Edwyrd conceded that maybe this was a good idea.

"But if there's nothing handy lying around to throw-" he went on.

"Frow a spektatuh at it."

" _My point is_ ," Edwyrd said, rather more loudly, "that we need another runner. So we can get the ball up to them quickly if we have to. Someone speedy, like-"

He threw the ball up into the air again.

It barely had time to slow and fall before it was snatched up by a spiralling, spinning silver blur.

Cressida landed neatly on her feet, and began to run. A couple of seconds later, she touched down at the other end of the pitch.

She jogged back to the Oldboyz, grinning, and tossed the ball back to Edwyrd.

"I first started playing when I was about seven," she said. "The Fourth Dorm Fiends, they used to call us. I remember, at the end-of-term matches, when I took down Mildred Jassburg, in the Upper Sixth, and broke her neck…good times." She frowned. "What're you all staring at?"

"Play fer us," said Grobb.

Edwyrd blanched.

"What?" he said. "No, no, no. That was very impressive, Miss Cressida," he conceded, "but you're…no, she's not going to play for us."

"Nothing wrong with having a human on an Orc team," Fourtooth said, scratching at his beard. "Not in principle, anyway. The Motley Horde takes just about anybody, for instance."

At the mention of the name 'Motley Horde', at the very back of the group, Luggen raised his head.

"It's not that simple," Edwyrd snapped. "You lot are orcs. She's only human. She can't take as much punishment as you. What if she got killed?"

"We could paint 'er green," Wazguttle suggested.

"You could paint her green," yelled Edwyrd, "but she still wouldn't be an orc!"

Cressida laid a calming hand on his shoulder.

"Look," she said. "Just give me a chance, master dwarf. You need a player; I need a job." She glanced around the Oldboyz. "How much are you being paid, anyway?"

"Ev'ry munf we get a shiny new pebble," Grobb said, puffing his chest out.

Edwyrd ran his hand over his eyes. Once again, he was beginning to sense that he was losing control of events.

"Fine," he said. "Look. We'll get you a helmet and some kit, and…you can trial for us."

He shook his finger vaguely up at Cressida. "You're just lucky it's only a university team we're going up against," he added.


	30. Chapter 30

Edwyrd was trying to help Cressida into her new team kit. It was a little difficult; the Oldboyz tended to just staple leather strips and metal plates over their shoulders and their legs and call it a day, whereas he suspected a human woman probably needed, at the very least, to protect her heart, lungs, and stomach from brutal gouging. And besides, he found it hard not to stare.

At last, sweeping up her mane of silver hair, she donned the blue-and-black helmet and stood, triumphant.

"How do I look?" she asked.

Edwyrd made a small uncertain noise.

"Um," he said, and gave up. "Magnificent. Completely magnificent."

She smiled, rather sweetly, and patted him on the head.

"Now, remember," he clucked, retreating to a safe distance, "stay on the wings. Don't get into contact if you can avoid it, and always be ready for a quick pass. Keep your head low and if you get tackled, don't stretch out your arms- Dok, will you stop that? We're not doing the whole 'painting her green' thing."

Cressida replied, wincing as another handful of green paint was slapped onto her face,

"Oh, no, let him. Feels like warpaint. And stop worrying about me, Edwyrd. Sigmar's bottom, it's only the local university team!"

"Well, now," Fourtooth said, from the entrance of the tent, "aren't you a sight to cause sore eyes, Cress. Boss, I bring glad tidings - we've got fans."

Edwyrd's eyes bulged.

"Fans?"

"Three fans, anyway," the wizard conceded. "They're sitting in the stands now. One of them came up to me and said, 'Is this where the match is with that orc team that punches first and then never really gets around to asking questions later?' and I'm pretty sure that must be a reference to us."

"Gosh," Edwyrd said. He felt rather emotional.

Wazguttle poked his head in through the tentflaps.

"Uvver team's 'ere, kotch," he said. "An' we've caught Badpipes der troll just in time. Fink 'e ate sumfink funny out in der woods, 'cos 'e's swayin' a bit, but uvverwise 'e's right as rain."

His big brow wrinkled in thought.

"You know," he said, "d'uvver team ain't what I'd fort. Fort dey'd be 'umies and dat."

Edwyrd looked up sharply.

"What d'you mean?" he asked. "What are they, then?"


	31. Chapter 31

The grey-kitted zombies lurched across the pitch. One of them almost got to the ball before it was taken out by a fast, chittering, rotten-looking creature on all four legs. By the endzone, two armoured, skeletal figures seemed to be testing their weight against a shambling mass of oozing purple flesh that appeared to have been stitched together from various sources.

Edwyrd sidled over to a desiccated, extremely tall skeleton in a black robe and golden chain who stood, watching from the sidelines.

"Er…are you the university coach?" he ventured.

The thing turned. Yellow, burning, implacable eyes.

" _I am the Master of Schwarzkopf University_ ," the skeleton said, its teeth clacking dully against one another.

"Right," said Edwyrd. "Right. Um…I was sort of expecting a human team."

The Master shook its head.

" _It was many centuries ago_ ," it said, " _that our hallowed halls were purged of life by the armies of the foul Beastmen. And it was in that same dread year that we rose once more from death, our studies incomplete, and set to work, that we might attain our grand goal of eternal life – true eternal life, not the mere shadow that you see before you. But we also,"_ it added, _"have a strong commitment to sporting activities._ "

"Fair enough," Edwyrd said, and sauntered back to the Oldboyz huddle. "Well, they're undead all right," he told the assembled orcs. "Which might make this tricky. And those ghouls on the wings…well, they'll be a nightmare to handle. All right…since we won the toss, I think it'd be best if we received and went for the Eagle's Talons play."

Bob Blacktooth raised his hand.

"What dat, kotch?"

"It's the one where you three start hitting things," Edwyrd said. "And then you four surround the ballcarrier. And then all five of you start hitting things."

There was a collective murmur of understanding.

Edwyrd gazed up at Badpipes. The great yellow troll was looking a little vaguer even than usual, swaying on its feet, snot dripping from both nostrils. "Does, er, he know the play?" he asked.

"Dat ain't how trolls work, kotch," said Wazguttle. "You jus' point 'im towards der uvver team an' 'ope 'e 'hits der uvver side first."

Edwyrd gave up.

"All right," he said. "Play well, all of you – and look after Cressida. Remember, she's your team-mate. No trying to eat her. 'ERE WE GO," he began to yell, "'ERE WE GO, 'ERE WE GO-"

Twelve verses later, the Oldboyz charged out onto the pitch.

Edwyrd strolled over to the stands and took his seat between Fourtooth and Squiggie.

A second later, a chill of pure terror ran up his spine. He turned around.

The seats were filled with spirits; wailing pale ghosts, blood-stained young humans moaning softly in white, translucent gowns, green-tinged, faint spectres that seemed constantly on the verge of melting away into the air.

" _The students do like to cheer our team on_ ," the Master said, from further down the bench. " _The Dean's playing today; he's something of a local celebrity on campus. Multiple eviscerations are usually expected._ "

Edwyrd had a thought.

"What are your entry standards?" he asked. "Because I've got a nephew back in Karak Kadrin. Smart kid, good at Blood Bowl. Maybe he'd like the curriculum here."

" _We have our own entrance exams_. _A range of academic subjects. Challenging, yes, but certainly, for the right intelligent young mind..._ "

"Ah."

" _He would also have to be dead, of course_."

"Probably better not to, in that case."

" _Still_ ," the Master said, " _you should bring him to our Open Day. Let him look around for himself_."

On-pitch, the goblin referee was trying to get some kind of order together. Edwyrd could make out the tiny figure of Cressida, perched on the farthest wing, facing up towards one of the slathering ghouls.

His stomach churned.

I got her into this, he thought. I could have told her not to play. What in Grimnir's name was I thinking?

From behind him, there came the slow, rhythmic sound of a thousand spirits clapping their hands together. A dreadful chant, rising up into the air.

"DEATH. DEATH. DEATH. DEATH."

And from the corner of the stand, he faintly made out a much fainter, raggedly determined little song;

"He's short! They're scary! They'll turn you all to jelly! It's the Oldboyzzzz, and Edwyrd Kettlebelly!"

Edwyrd gave the supporters a bemused little wave and got a cheer in return.

Just as he turned back to the pitch, the whistle blew.


	32. Chapter 32

Cressida's helmet slipped over her eyes at the exact moment when the ghoul struck her.

She stumbled backwards, flailing, as a set of twenty furious claws dug into her armour, trying to prise it apart, shrieking, its pincer teeth digging in through the leather-

The weight lightened. She managed to tug the straps of her helmet loose, forcing it free, and gazed wildly about for her attacker.

Luggen gave her the shortest of nods before trundling back down the pitch in search of the ball. At her feet, the ghoul was making distressed little whimpering noises.

Cressida glanced back towards the stand, where she could clearly make out the figure of Edwyrd Kettlebelly. He was on his feet, peering anxiously towards her.

 _I got him into this_ , she thought. _I could have told him I wasn't going to play. Oh, Sigmar, what was I thinking?_

 _I just have to be brave_ , she thought. _Like the rest of them. They aren't afraid of anything._

Near the endzone, Grobb charged head-first into a howling, hairy apparition that was smacking Dok McKlowd about. Both of them fell over.

 _Not brave_ , she corrected herself. _They're just too stupid to be scared._

 _Not sure I can manage that, unfortunately._

She took a step forward and almost ran into a purple mountain. The great undead creature's eyes were aflame with an eerie green light. It raised a single fist, stitched together from rotten flesh.

'FORTES FORTUNA ADIUVAT,' roared the Dean.

Cressida ducked, and ran.

Dodging past the fumbling advances of a decapitated zombie, she finally caught sight of the ball, in the hands of an armoured skeleton that was currently trying to kick the fallen Wazguttle in the groin. She took the horrid thing's head in both hands and thrust her knee up towards it, hard.

A cracking sound, followed by an appreciable moan of delight from the crowd.

And then the ball tumbled down, halted by her feet.

She stared at it, paralysed.

'Fink you're s'posed ter pick it up,' Wazguttle said, from the ground.

'Could be wrong, though,' he added, and fell back.

Cressida leant down, scooping up the ball in one hand, and began to run. A howling ghoul leapt towards her, but had its trajectory suddenly altered by Flirksmasher, who caught it by the leg and swung it like a bolas in the opposite direction.

She kept running. A hand snatched hold of her ankle. An odd sound, and the pressure on her trouser leg didn't loosen, but her assailant seemed to have been left behind.

She kept running. The troll Badpipes was ahead, furiously smashing at the empty earth where an opponent might have been standing some considerable time ago. And beyond him, beyond the smashed body of a zombie, was the endzone-

'AB OBICE SAEVIOR IBIT-'

Cressida found herself being lifted, helplessly into the air. Enormous fingers had grabbed hold of her waist.

The Dean grinned dumbly at her, stitched-together gums tearing and bleeding with the effort.

'POST MORTEM NIHIL EST,' he said. 'IPSAQUE MORS NIHIL.'

Cressida kicked furiously out at his face. Her boot took off quite a bit of flesh, without seeming to make an impression.

He snatched hold of her leg with his free hand.

'ABIISTIS, DULCES CARICAE,' he said, and prepared to pull in both directions.

Luggen leapt, with the smallest of grunts, onto the flesh golem's head, and, wrapping his legs around the Dean's neck, he proceeded to methodically hammer both fists in the general direction of the monster's brain.

The Dean let go of Cressida's leg and tried to rip off Luggen's arms instead, but was prevented from doing so by Dik Der Cunnin', who grabbed hold of the enormous swinging hand and began to pull off the fingers.

Cressida, hanging limply, still clinging on to the ball, turned just in time to see Badpipes shambling towards her, a look of sheer delight on his snot-coated, stupid face.

He struck the Dean in the middle of the golem's body, with arms extended in a manner that suggested he was actually trying to hug him.

'Oh, no,' Cressida murmured, feeling the Dean's weight shift uncertainly to one side. 'oh, no…'

All five of them swung, together, in a circle, like the most gruesome of spinning tops, and finally, they toppled.

Cressida felt the Dean's grip on her finally slip. Pulling out, she dropped and rolled, stretched out a single hand - and dropped the ball onto the ground over the painted chalk line.

The whistle blew.

'TOUCHDOWN!' she yelled, exhausted and triumphant, both arms raised to the sky, feeling the adrenaline course through her. 'TOUCHDOWN! TOUCHDOWN!'

She turned back towards the pitch.

Luggen and Dik were standing over the flesh golem's broken body, regarding it with some curiosity.

'Fink it's dead?' Dik asked.

Luggen stamped down a couple of times on the Dean's head, his head cocked curiously.

'That oughta do it,' he said.


	33. Chapter 33

Edwyrd was laughing: wildly, madly, ecstatically.

'They did it!' he muttered to himself, shaking his head in disbelief. 'They actually did it!'

The Oldboyz came sauntering to meet him across the battered pitch with an air of unmistakeable pride. Wazguttle, heavily bruised and with one eye closed, was carrying Cressida on his shoulders.

'She an orc,' Grobb kept saying. 'She ain't no humie. She an orc.'

She hopped down to the grass, unsteadily, and gave Edwyrd a wink.

'Told you I'd be all right,' she said, but she looked a little pale.

Edwyrd felt a cold, bony tap on his shoulder. He turned around.

The Master gave him a friendly grin.

' _An excellent match_ ,' the skeleton said. 'Truly, a _good time was had by all. May I invite your team to the Great Hall for a post-game feast_?'

'Thank you,' Edwyrd said, taking its hand. He glanced past him towards the endzone, where two werewolves were attempting to scrape up the remains of the Dean. "Sorry about your golem," he said.

The Master shrugged.

' _He'll be all right_ ,' it said. ' _You can't keep a good man down_.'


	34. Chapter 34

"Edwyrd," Cressida said, on the cart the next morning, "what was it the Master whispered in your ear as we were leaving?"

Edwyrd scratched his head.

"Um," he said, "it was something like, _The gift of foresight brings me no joy, my friend. A great and terrible new evil awaits you at the Chaos Cup; a threat to the fabric of our very reality. Before the season is out, one of your number will join us amongst the dead_."

"Tch," Fourtooth said, lighting his pipe. "Omens, eh? I once met a prophet fella who told me to beware a tall stranger who brought terror and darkness in his wake, and sure enough, I was audited the very next month."

Cressida gave Edwyrd a little nudge.

"So," she said, "what's next for us?"

Edwyrd checked his tour itinerary.

"Well," he said, "first we'll be taking on a Skaven team in something called 'the Dread Under-Tunnels of Kreizburg.' Then there's a forest leagues to the north-east, where we've got a friendly against some wood elves. And we'll be arriving in time to register for the Chaos Cup about six weeks later, when we should have a few days to acclimatise before the play-offs begin."

 _This is actually happening_ , he thought, startled. _The Chaos Cup play-offs._

 _What was it they used to say in the papers? Pray You Slay-Off In The Play-Offs, Or You'll Be Prey-Off._

It wasn't exactly a catchy headline.

If the various disclaimers Bruckheim had made him sign were accurate, losing teams had traditionally been dismembered, disembowelled, conflagrated, eviscerated, ritually flayed, enucleated, annihilated, lobotomised, and ritually murdered in some kind of deviant Slaaneshi rite that sounded either vaguely enticing or distressingly unsexy, depending on the precise meaning of the word 'impale'.

When it came to the coaches, of course, they weren't so merciful.

 _And we're heading right into the middle of it. Like lambs to the slaughter._

"...balls," Edwyrd said, but very quietly.


	35. Chapter 35

Pith'igor, Head Operations Officer in charge of preparations for the Chaos Cup, was having a seriously bad day.

The enormous main stadium was behind schedule, half-complete, and the workforce was steadily diminishing, largely because all four of the Dark Gods had chosen to show their distinct approval for the tournament by cursing the labourers with 1) insatiable bloodlust, 2) insatiable nymphomania, 3) a virulent, infectious itching disease, 4) unexpected transformation of various limbs and bodily organs.

The mess had taken hours to clean up; then some bright spark had called in a local necromancer to reanimate the corpses, but the old bugger had just sucked at his teeth and insisted that it would take another three weeks to order in the body parts.

Not that it wasn't wonderful, Pith'igor added quickly to himself, to have the dark gods showing their appreciation for the sport…but their little games were making it rather hard for him to get anything done.

A couple of priests had attempted to get a message across to the four deities yesterday, politely requesting a brief moratorium on divine intervention; their bloodied, boil-coated remnants were discovered splattered across the roofs of the player-village the very next morning.

He glared down at his notes, trying to ignore the sudden shadow that had been cast across the desk.

"All right," he said, eventually. "What do you want?"

Fellorian smiled at him.

"Greetings, beastman," he said. "I'm here to register my…ah…my employer's team."

Pith'igor snorted - and glanced past the wizened sorcerer, towards the eleven hulking figures that were standing just outside the tent, clad in purple hoods and robes. Ogres, perhaps?

"Registration doesn't begin till next week," he said. "Come back then."

"Yes," Fellorian said. He sighed. "My employer was...rather insistent that we get here early."

He turned and gazed wearily back out across the miles of flat, deserted wasteland.

"She, ah, thought there might be a queue," he added.

"Not my problem," Pith'igor said. "Come back next week, I said."

Fellorian raised a hand.

The eleven shapes, without hesitation, took a step forward. Pith'igor heard a strange noise – a kind of whirring. And a clunk.

The purple robes dropped.

Eleven enormous golden men stood in the entrance of the tent.

Pith'igor stared at them, his mouth wide open. They stared back at him, with burning blue eyes.

"Look," he quavered. "Why don't I, er, write down your team name now, and, um, when registration begins, I'll sign you up myself? First thing. I promise."

"That would be very kind," Fellorian said.

Pith'igor fumbled blindly for a scrap of paper, unable to take his eyes off the eleven golden figures.

Like many beastmen, raised amongst the flesh-eating feral tribes of the twisted woodlands on the outskirts of the Empire, he considered himself a man of the world, and not prone to making moral judgements.

But there was, he realised, something about these figures that felt inescapably, ineffably _wrong_ ; their proportions were all off, with bulging arms and legs and absurdly huge pauldrons. It was as if a creature in a cave, being told about human beings for the first time, had tried to create one out of gold and brass, but hadn't been able to get it right. And their faces, more mask-like than any mask should be, blank and terrible and lacking in any kind of humanity or inhumanity alike.

Pith'igor had never heard of the uncanny valley effect, so he was unable to put his finger on exactly what made him shiver, but right now a single, primal instinct was flowing from brain to hooves, making them twitch with a terrible urgency:

 _Run. Run. Run._

"So, um," he said, pulling himself together, "…which team are you?"

Fellorian told him.

Pith'igor looked back at the eleven identical figures. None of them had moved.

"The Motley Horde?" he ventured. "They, um, don't look very motley."

Fellorian grinned nastily.

"No," he said. "We're taking things in a new, ah, business direction."


	36. Chapter 36

" _And a very good morning to you, sports fans everywhere! Bob Bifford and I are standing on the field of the brand-new stadium for this year's Chaos Cup. The grass is being mown, the chalk lines are being set, and we're all getting ready for what should be an epic and gore-filled tournament!"_

" _That's right, Jim. Registrations have just opened – and our latest scoop for you, like the proverbial Beast of Nurgle, is a big 'un. The rumour on the underground grapevine is that the Orcland Raiders will not, repeat, will not be participating in the Chaos Cup this year. Inside sources report that the team has not been seen since a friendly warm-up match against the Motley Horde just two weeks ago - a hastily-arranged fixture which remains shrouded in mystery, since nobody seems to be able to find any surviving spectators from the game."_

" _Friendlies, eh? They really should find a different name for them."_

 _"Team coach Bonehead Urgitz was found wandering aimlessly on the mountaintops some days after the game, covered in the blood of his teammates and babbling incoherently. In a statement, he said..."_

A rustle of paper.

"' _...I have seen the death of our world and the squalid birth of a stillborn new era. The eleven golden men will murder the land and burn the sky. The firmament will splinter and all of us shall come to naught. Beware! Beware!' After which he turned and tossed himself from the cliff, splitting his skull open on the jagged rocks many miles below."_

" _You knew Urgitz, Bob…what d'you make of all that?"_

" _Urgitz has always been a strategist, Jim. There's a plan here, we can be sure of that. It'll be interesting to see where he goes from here."_

" _Okey-dokey, then. Join us after these messages, when we'll be taking a behind-the-scenes peek at the fabulous opening ceremony the Cup's organisers have planned for us, including the ritual sacrifice of a High Elven princess inside a colossal burning wicker model of the trophy itself, and Bob will be giving us his predicted favourite to win. Any teasers you can give us for now?"_

" _Chaos All-Stars."_

" _Oh, that's just great, Bob. Real professional sporting journalism, right there."_


	37. Chapter 37

"A good game, all in all," Edwyrd said, breathless. "You kept them pinned down, and didn't give them opportunities for passing manoeuvres. Just one thing. One tiny thing. When you form into a tunnel around your opponents at the end of the match, you're just supposed to applaud them. _Not_ use your strategic advance to attack them from all sides and beat them viciously to death."

An arrow whistled past his head. He kept running.

"Dey were only elves, kotch," Grobb said.

"Elves have feelings too," Edwyrd snapped back, ducking under a low-hanging tree branch. "Feelings…and…deadly projectiles, as it turns out."

"Look on the bright side," Cressida said. She leapt nimbly up onto a fallen trunk, swung from the nearest branch, and dropped down into the grass. "This is great agility training. Is...er...Badpipes all right?"

The troll, who had lifted up the cart in two massive hands, glanced at her, smiled, and continued to ambled through the foliage. There was a long white-feathered arrow sticking through his head.

"I don't think it hit anything that matters," Edwyrd said.

He dared to glance back over his shoulder. "Thank the gods, they've falling back into the trees. Slow down, guys. Everyone all right? Nobody's missing? Nobody's dead?"

"I fink I...uh…?"

"You ain't dead, Grobb," said Wazguttle. "If you's talkin', you ain't dead. Dat's what dey call a telltale sign." He tapped the side of his head knowingly.

Edwyrd was shaking his head as they stepped out of the treeline and into the sunlight of the grassy roadside.

"We're going to need to have a serious discussion," he said, "about discipline. Flirksmasher, I saw you toss that Wardancer into the side of an oak tree. How do you think you might be able to avoid that kind of situation developing in the future?"

Flirksmasher lowered his gaze and thought for some time.

"Before the match," he said slowly, "we burn down all der forests."

He almost walked into - and over - Fourtooth, who had come to an abrupt halt directly ahead, his pipe dangling from his gobsmacked mouth.

"Well," he mumbled, "would you look at that?"

Edwyrd's stomach churned.

Far ahead, past mossy hilltops and ruin-strewn crags, tiny birds circling high above...was a city of lights. At its heart, like a colossal glowing egg nestling in a bed of spikes, was the curved dome of the Chaos Cup stadium.

And, stretching out from one horizon to the other along the length of the cobbled merchant's trail they called Buckman's Road, was a convoy unlike anything Edwyrd had ever seen.

Humans, lizardmen, elves, dwarves, orcs, species he didn't even recognise, all of them dressed in the vivid colours of their chosen team. By the roadside, hawkers, merchants and rogues were peddling their variously crappy wares, from team shirts to life-size cardboard models of Morg'N'Thorg.

As the Oldboyz watched, a party of Bright Wizards in Reikland Reavers gear, cheering, let off a series of small aerial explosions that formed briefly into the shape of Griff Oberwald's face.

"We ain't gon' have ter go to der back of dat, are we, kotch?" asked Grobb. "Cos o' fair play an' respekterbilty an' dat uvver stuff yoo's always goin' on about."

Edwyrd thought about it.

"Nah," he said, at last. "Let's get cuts."


	38. Chapter 38

Pith'igor scribbled a note in his journal. It was huge and flesh-bound and titled 'Kaus Kup – Riggistrashun Tims'.

Ahead of him, the queue was getting steadily longer. A mercilessly hot sun was beating down on the waiting teams; sweat dripped from foreheads and players were beginning to droop with exhausation.

Pith'igor didn't mind. Perhaps some of them would even provide him with some mild entertainment by dying of heatstroke while they were queuing.

"All right," he said, "Lowdown Rats, you're registered for the Chaos Cup play-offs. You'll know your group number and first match details by tomorrow evening. Tent-space in the player village is currently a free-for-all, so I hope you brought plenty of weapons. Have a great tournament, and I'd just like to offer you my personal wish that you don't get mauled too horribly this year. Next!"

He glanced up.

"Ah, Prince Valeris," he drawled, greeting the haughty, blonde-haired High Elf with a bow (as per the Blood Bowl regulations on inter-species co-operation during a tournament) and a barely perceptible sneer (as per Pith'igor's own personal beliefs that all elves, especially ones who dressed up in golden armour and ponced about with their nose in the sky, should be drawn, quartered, flayed alive, and have their kidneys placed on a platter as an appropriate sacrifice to Khorne). "It is our pleasure to have you - and the Elhuin Falcons - amongst us again, sire."

Valeris looked down his nose at the beastman and gave him a practiced look of undisguised revulsion.

"Register us for the tournament, loathsome creature," he said, and do it quickly, before my companions and I decide we can we can simply no longer stand the sight of you, and make it our business to cleanse you from existence."

Pith'igor, hairy fists clenching and unclenching vigorously, beneath his desk, smiled, nodded, and said,

"Yes, sire. Of course, sire."

Valeris turned back to his teammates and began to talk loudly about the degrading inevitability of having to speak with goat-people at a Chaos Cup tournament, and the sorts of suitable punishments that, should he rule the entire Old World, would be doled out to all Gor, Ungor, Bestigor, Minotaur, Caprigor, and any other unimaginatively-suffixed beastman type he could possibly think of. The elves tittered in agreement.

Pith'igor, head buried in his journal and lost in dreams in which he tore off Prince Valeris' pale, elegant hands and fed them to him, didn't glance up and notice the party of very large orcs dressed in blue and black until they were almost upon him. There seemed to be a couple of humans with them as well, and a dwarf, and they were strolling past the line without the slightest care for the angry shouts and missiles hurled in their direction. That was something you didn't see every day.

Wazguttle barged through the entirety of the Elhuin Falcons without a second thought, stood in front of the desk, and gave Pith'igor a friendly wave.

"'Ullo," he said. "We's der Oldboyz."

Pith'igor found a grin spreading unexpectedly across his face. Maybe it was the heat getting to him, or something to do with the look of scarlet outrage on Prince Valeris' face.

"And hello to you, sir," he said, with a respectful bob of his horns. "Let me just get that written up for you. Is 'Oldboyz' your full team name, or…"

From somewhere behind the orc's bulky shoulders, Prince Valeris loudly cleared his throat.

"Uh…fink so," Wazguttle said, scratching his head. He seemed a little confused. "Or…mebbe…mebbe we're called 'Wazguttle'."

"Don't be daft, Waz," Edwyrd said, pushing his way forward after him. "We're the Orctown Oldboyz, sir Gor. We should be in your lists under Edwyrd Kettlebelly. K-E-"

Prince Valeris cleared his throat again, more insistently. Wazguttle glanced down and gave him a sympathetic look.

"Got a sore froat?" he asked. "If you want, I could put you outta yer misery."

"Excuse me, _orc_ ," the elf snapped, "but we were here first!"

"The Orctown Oldboyz," Pith'igor said, trying extremely hard not to laugh. "Yes, here you are. All right, Master Kettlebelly…you're clear to go through. You'll know your group number and first match details by tomorrow morning. Tent-space is-"

Prince Valeris cried, loudly, stamping his foot,

"But we were here _first_! Is this some sort of conspiracy? Are all of the lesser races ganging up on us? I…I will not stand for this!"

Pith'igor's smile spread wider.

"Please bear with us, your highness," he said, with a calmness perfectly calculated to be as irritating as possible. "This will just take another moment, and then I can handle your case."

Wazguttle leant down to Prince Valeris.

" _Dere_ is a queue, yoo know," he said, chidingly.

Prince Valeris drew a slim silver blade from its sheath.

"Men!" he shouted. "Let's teach these brutes a lesson in respect! I will…er, men?"

There was the sound of a lithe armoured body hitting the ground. Then another. Then, followed by an amusing squawk, a third.

Ten seconds later, Pith'igor came out from under his desk and gazed down at the groaning heap of elves.

"They may have been first," he murmured vaguely, "but who was there last?"

In the queue behind the Oldboyz, a rather large fight was breaking out. A teamful of High Elves had attempted to run towards the short-lived melee at the registration desk to help out their brethren, but had found their progress blocked by a Pro Elf team, who'd never liked their aristocratic cousins all that much anyway. A stray bunch had hit an Ogre, who'd woken up and sat on a Dwarf. From there, things had got a little complicated. A couple of reporters and a Cabalvision mage were hurrying towards the scene and setting up their equipment a safe distance away.

Edwyrd looked a little embarrassed.

"Er…sorry," he said. "We didn't mean to cause any trouble."

"Think nothing of it," Pith'igor said, chuckling lightly under his breath. "Think nothing of it at all, sir dwarf. Punching out the Elhuin Falcons…well, well, well. Your boys do know how to make an entrance, don't they?"

Under Edwyrd's feet, Prince Valeris mumbled through bruised lips something or other about an undying curse upon the dwarf's very soul.

"Right," said Pith'igor, returning to his desk. "You're all booked up. I recommend you pitch your camp in the field on the south-eastern side of the player village. The deadly Mists of Nurgle are rare there, and it's currently only occupied by a bunch of halflings, who I suspect you'll make short work of. In you go, and the very best of luck to you in this Chaos Cup!"

"Thanks," Edwyrd replied. "Come on, then- oh, _ladz_ , no…"

The Oldboyz were staring wistfully towards the raging, multi-species battle.

"Can we?" Grobb asked, jumping up and down. "Kotch, can we?"

Edwyrd sighed.

"All right," he said. "We'll meet you in the tavern at midday. And if one of you gets injured, I swear to Nuffle I'll bite all of your heads off."

The Oldboyz grinned, turned as one, and charged.

Edwyrd, Fourtooth and Cressida strolled on through the great pale bone-gates. From behind them, there was a strangled cry of,

 _"Oh, Sigmar, not the troll! Not the-"_


End file.
